


Don't Let Go

by Kate_Shepard



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Alternate Universe, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Dirty Talk, Exhibitionism, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Smut, Light Dom/sub, Oral Sex, Porn, Porn With Plot, Porn with Feelings, Shameless Smut, Sheterius, Smut, indoctrination
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-22
Updated: 2016-06-16
Packaged: 2018-06-03 17:22:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 29,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6619588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kate_Shepard/pseuds/Kate_Shepard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU where Saren is on Noveria and has not yet been "enhanced" by Sovereign. Shepard convinces him he's indoctrinated. He fights it off and joins her team.</p><p>Because I have a seriously strange thing for Saren/FemShep.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> BioWare owns the Mass Effect universe and all characters. I just play with it for my own entertainment.

Shepard motioned Garrus and Liara into position to cover her charge. She’d been surprised to learn that a turian Spectre had accompanied Matriarch Benezia to Noveria. As Garrus had told her many times, turians didn’t like the cold. She’d expected Saren to send Benezia here alone to do his dirty work. Dirty work, indeed. First geth and killing Nihlus, then the thorian and its creepers, then a krogan slave army, and now rachni. She wondered if his horrors ever ceased or if they were in for something more. He claimed his mind was his own and yet no sane man would ever want to bring back the rachni. It was just further proof of his indoctrination.

Saren stood at a console in the room before them. Two geth flanked him, but they weren’t looking at the doorway. They were looking at the grates on the floor. She almost laughed. It was about time he got to experience the backlash of all the problems he’d caused. His voice cut sharply through the room. He was berating someone for their failure and stupidity. Nice guy. Liara tensed when Benezia’s voice came over the comm. Shepard motioned for her to focus. She pulled it together and then Garrus sent out a chain overload as Liara cast a warp and Shepard charged Saren. The rogue Spectre slammed hard into the terminal, cracking the controls, but recovered quickly and she took an elbow to the face as he spun around to face her. “Shepard, you fool,” he hissed. “They will kill us all.”

“Should have thought about that before you unleashed them on the galaxy again,” she growled as she emptied a shotgun round into his belly while warping him. It wouldn’t kill him, but it would help whittle down his shields. The geth around them were down and she expected the rattle of Garrus’ assault rifle or the crack of Liara’s pistol. It didn’t come. Saren’s metal geth hand cracked her across the face instead and she fell back a step before firing her shotgun again. Where the hell were Garrus and Liara?

“Looks like your friends won’t be joining us,” he said maliciously, stalking toward her. She warped his shields again and heard her barrier hiss as he did the same. “Give it up, human. I am far more powerful than you. I was killing humans better than you when you were a child.”

“That just makes you old,” she retorted, throwing him back. He staggered but didn’t go far. A chill settled around her as she realized that she was outmatched and alone. There was a reason Saren had lived twice the average lifetime of a Spectre and had been so highly regarded by the Council. He warped her barrier again as she shot him—in the face this time—and felt his own slugs slam into her armor. She couldn’t hold her barrier forever and continue her biotic attacks, and the room had almost no cover. To make matters worse, one of the vent grates flew up and she heard the skittering clicks of a rachni. If she broke off from Saren to kill the rachni, he’d take advantage. If she continued to focus on Saren, the damn bug would further wear down her barriers with its acid. She’d rather be shot than deal with an acid burn again. She pivoted and shot the rachni. As she’d expected, a biotic attack took down her barrier. Another vent exploded upward, but this one was behind Saren, so she ignored it. Let him deal with his own creepy, giant, flesh-eating roaches.

When its acid splashed across Saren’s back and splattered her armor, she jumped back. He noticed the widening of her eyes with a feral grin and stepped to the side, letting her take the brunt of the splash. She threw the creature back and shot it until her shotgun overheated. Saren’s fist caught her on the side of the head; however, she saw it coming with time to move just enough that it missed her temple, and rather than being stunned, it was simply painful. She ignored it and jabbed the pressure point between the plating on his wrist that Garrus had shown her once and disarmed him. In response, he wrenched her shotgun away and hit her in the face with it. She felt her nose break. Blood poured down into her mouth. She spat it on him. Maybe he was allergic to levos. The move caught him by surprise just enough that she was able to pistol whip him and was satisfied to hear the long plate on his cheek crack. 

His reach didn’t help him this close. Garrus had taught her how to fight a turian in close quarters. Saren wasn’t expecting the blows she rained down on him, but he countered with swift efficiency. In moments, their hands were locked around each other’s throats. She brought her feet up and planted them on his waist before pushing off with her legs and tearing away from his grasp. She felt the metal slice the sides of her neck, but fortunately, they missed the major blood vessels. She rolled and came up in a crouched fighting stance. He shot her with her own damn shotgun. Rage burned through her. She charged, knocking him back before warping him and putting his pistol to his throat. His shields took most of the damage, but it was enough to finally drop them. She fired again as he swept her legs out from under her. She went down with a sharp exhalation of breath. Before she could roll away, he was on her. 

She could beat Garrus with ease when sparring, but grappling with a turian was another matter entirely. He outweighed her by at least a hundred pounds and had more than a foot of height on her. She raked her boot down the sensitive hide behind his spur and locked her foot between it and his calf. He snarled as she pushed, trying to break the bone, and twisted her wrist until the bones ground together. Breaking his spur would make walking difficult, if not impossible, but breaking her wrist meant she likely wouldn’t be able to hold her shotgun. However, she didn’t have possession of the shotgun and she could fire a pistol and use her biotics with one hand. She glared up into his eerie blue eyes and kicked as hard as she could. He howled and completed the twist, snapping the delicate bones in her wrist. Her vision swam, but she used her free arm to send a throw field out and tossed him across the room. 

Neither of them moved. They sat where they were, huffing for breath. She heard another skitter, but before she could react, he raised her shotgun and shot the creature before it could leave the vent. She let her head fall back against the floor. “You just had to go and bring the rachni back. Because husks and the geth weren’t enough,” she muttered. Alarms cut off his response as the lights abruptly shut off and a red glow filled the room. She cursed, “Damn it. I just _fixed_ the goddamn power!”

Saren shifted and she glared at him. He said, “It would appear we have a problem. I sealed the door against your friends when I heard you begin your charge. The lock requires power to be overridden. There is no power; thus, there is no heat and no way out of here unless you wish to attempt the ventilation system, which likely has thousands of those creatures in it. Can you survive this cold alone?” She knew he couldn’t. His physiology didn’t allow him to produce enough warmth to withstand extreme cold. Turians were designed to expel heat rather than hold it in.

She couldn’t withstand it, either, but she wasn’t going to admit to that. Her armor had heating units, but they’d been active throughout the mission and had cut to backup power while going through the facility. She’d been unconcerned once she had reactivated the power, and with it, the heat. However, she didn’t know how long it would take Garrus and Liara to restore the power, or if they were even out there and able to try. For all she knew, Benezia had gotten to them. Garrus was a strong fighter and Liara a powerful biotic, but the asari hadn’t fought more than the occasional looter or pirate before joining Shepard’s team. She didn’t know if she could handle a group of commandos, especially considering that they were led by her own damn mother. Honestly, she was more worried about them than herself. 

Saren took her silence for assent and said, “As much as I loathe the idea of working cooperatively with any human, and especially you, it is not unheard of for enemies to form temporary alliances when faced with situations such as these. Live to fight another day and whatnot.”

“You want to call a truce?” she asked disbelievingly. 

“Want? No,” he said. “However, we are currently located within a glacier above which a blizzard is raging. The labs are located here with the power shortage as a failsafe. The cold is enough to kill almost anything that might get loose and that includes both humans and turians. The temperature is already dropping. On our own, we will both be frozen in a matter of hours. What I want is to survive. Your people and mine are aware of our location. One or the other will restore the power and come for us. When that happens, we may resume our altercation.”

“You’ve mentioned that,” she grumbled, remembering his claims on Virmire. “Survival. What good is survival if you’re a slave? Living and surviving are two completely different things.”

“If you do not survive, you have no chance to live again,” he said. “I am trying to save as many people as I can, Shepard. Surely, you of all people can understand that.”

“I do,” she said, sitting up. “But you’re taking the coward’s way out and you’re wrong. Think about it, Saren. I, a human, am looking at the same damn thing you are and calling you craven!”

“What would you have me do, Shepard?” he demanded. “You cannot possibly comprehend their power. They destroyed the Protheans! You would allow them to do the same to us out of your own stubborn pride!”

“No,” she said. “I wouldn’t. If we stand together, if we fight as one, we can beat them or at least die trying with our heads held high. What happened to never seeing a turian’s back until he’s dead? They’re just machines, Saren, and machines can be broken!”

“That is reductive, Shepard,” he sneered. 

“I don’t know why I bother,” she huffed. “You won’t listen. You can’t. Sovereign owns you now. It’s in your head, isn’t it? Whispering to you. Telling you what to do. Twisting your thoughts.”

“No!” he protested. “I told you on Virmire. My studies—”

“Oh, come on!” she shouted. “Whatever you may be, you aren’t stupid, Arterius. Your experiments are inherently flawed.”

He narrowed his eyes at her and said, “Explain, human.”

“You were studying the effects of indoctrination on indoctrinated test subjects,” she said. “Sovereign is controlling your test subjects. Therefore, the results will show whatever Sovereign wants them to. If it thinks that reducing their functionality will prove to you that you aren’t indoctrinated because you can still function, then that’s what it’s going to do to them. The entire thing is biased.”

“It wouldn’t do that,” he said. 

“Why not?” she asked. “Do you think the ancient sentient machine determined to destroy all life in the galaxy has conceptions of honor or that it can’t lie?”

“It has no reason to do so,” he said. “The Reapers could simply kill us all if they wished. They don’t need us.”

“Then why are they accepting your help?” she countered. “They aren’t based on emotion. They have no mercy or goodwill. You’re even more ruthless than I am. Tell me, Saren. If you were the Reapers, what would you do?”

“Divide and conquer,” he said immediately, rising to replace the grates and drag the geth onto them to prevent any more rachni from entering.

She said, “Exactly. If we’re busy fighting against ourselves, we’re either ignoring the real threat or spread too thin to face it. It simply makes their extermination of us easier. Conservation of energy at work. What use could they possibly have for you once the rest of us are dead? They’ll go back out into dark space and you’ll, what, serve Sovereign? How? How, exactly, does an organic being serve a machine that’s going to be lying in wait for another fifty-thousand years? They don’t need you once they’ve accomplished their goal. What do you do with a slave that’s outlived its use?”

“You’re wrong!” he insisted wildly. 

“How? Tell me how I’m wrong,” she said. “Convince me with logic rather than fear or fanaticism, Saren, that joining them will truly save _anyone_ rather than simply prolonging our lives until everyone else is gone. Convince me that our heads won’t be the last on the chopping block, but there all the same. Use that magnificent fucking brain of yours for one damn second and _think_.”

He began to pace frantically, hobbling on his injured leg. He muttered to himself as if having an argument within his own mind. She watched in fascination as he battled with himself. His talons raked against his fringe and pushed the hood off of his head. They encountered the ports at the back of his neck and he stopped abruptly. Seeming to truly see himself for the first time, he looked down at the geth arm and the port on his leg. When he lifted his cybernetic eyes to her, he said desolately, “We can’t defeat them, Shepard.”

“I thought you were a turian, Arterius,” she challenged. 

He looked back down at his arm and said, “So did I.” 

“Then what the hell are you going to do about it?” she demanded. “Are you going to fight for your people or are you going to just hand them over to the machines like an offering to a malevolent god?”

“I’m trying to fight for my people,” he insisted.

“No,” she disagreed as her heating unit died with a click. “You’re trying to save yourself. If you’re dead either way, then are you going to die like a turian or like an obsequious volus? All your talk about turian superiority and here you are cowering while a human leads the fight against the thing you fear too much to face.” She shook her head in disgust. 

“Enough!” he shouted. “You’re a fool if you don’t fear them.”

“Oh, they terrify me,” she said. “Talking to Sovereign on Virmire made my blood run cold. I’m no fool, Arterius. I just refuse to be a slave to anything, including my own fear. That’s why we have no choice but to fight them. What is the Conduit? Why does Sovereign want you to find it? Why are you here? Are you a turian or a volus, Saren Arterius? Are you a goddamn Spectre or a sniveling cur?”

“The Conduit is a back door onto the Citadel,” he said. Sovereign screamed inside his head. 

“Okay,” she drawled. “And that’s useful, how, exactly? The Citadel isn’t exactly difficult to access. Why is that so important?”

“Surely even you cannot be that dense,” he snarled. His tone changed so that he sounded like he was attempting to explain a concept to a child. “What would happen if a fleet of geth ships led by a massive, unidentifiable dreadnought came pouring through the Widow relay?”

“They'd close the arms," she answered as the picture came together in her mind. "So, you need a back door to get your army in and open them because even if you were already there, without an army, they'd just gun you down as soon as you tried. But why is the Citadel important, Saren?” she pressed. It was getting colder and she was beginning to shiver.

He clenched his head in his hands and gnashed his teeth. Each word came as though being ripped from him. “It’s a dormant mass relay leading into dark space. When activated, it will allow the Reapers to flow through into the galaxy to begin their harvest.”

She stared at him in shock for a moment and said, “How do we stop it?”

“You think Sovereign would give me that information?” he snapped. His head felt as though it was being danced on by elcor. 

“Where is the Conduit?” she asked. 

“Ilos,” he answered and fell to his knees, gripping his head as if trying to keep it from coming apart in his hands.

“Why Ilos?” she asked. “Wasn’t that a Prothean world?” He groaned and bent forward, but didn’t answer. Hesitantly, she went to him and knelt in front of him. “Look at me, Saren,” she ordered. “Hold it together. You can do this.”

He jerked at the touch of her hand on his face, but looked up at her with agony visible even in his cybernetic eyes. He said, “I don’t know. There are ruins…archives. Maybe…maybe there’s a clue there. Shepard, I can’t fight it forever. Sovereign is too strong.”

“How do we get to Ilos?” she asked. “Tell me that and I’ll let you go.”

He gripped her arm above the break in her wrist and said, “Don’t let go. The Mu Relay. Benezia sent me the coordinates. You’ll have to take them from my omni-tool. I can’t…spirits! Don’t let go, Shepard. If you do, I’m lost.” He hated admitting it to her, but he was fighting an internal battle for his sanity and she was the one thing that had stayed constant since all of this began. Her internal surety made him want to believe that, despite being human, she had answers to which he wasn’t privy.

“I’m not going anywhere,” she said. “Give me your arm.”

She activated his omni-tool and sent the relay coordinates to her own. She could see in the way he held himself that he was fighting the urge to rip her throat out for it. No doubt Sovereign was raging at this betrayal. She had to figure out what to do with him when they were free. If she left him, Sovereign would reclaim him and complete his indoctrination. He would pursue her, find the Conduit, and activate the Citadel and she had no idea how to stop him. If she arrested him, he would either be imprisoned while Sovereign ripped his mind to shreds or be killed outright. He was as much a victim as he was a villain, a sad anti-hero trying to do the right thing in the wrong ways. In the end, he was not the one who had committed the atrocities that had been done. He was merely a pawn and he was much more valuable to her alive. If he could convince the Council that the Reaper threat was real, then they stood a greater chance of gaining cooperation between the races. Strategically, he was valuable…if he could fight off the indoctrination.

She said, “The way I see it, you have three options. I can kill you here and make it quick. You can kill yourself and redeem yourself that way. Or you can fight Sovereign and join me.”

He laughed bitterly. “As if anyone would have faith in me now even if I could shake Sovereign’s effects. My credibility is in tatters.”

“I believe you,” she said.

“You are a fool, Shepard,” he replied. “This close, with your defenses down, I could rip your throat out.”

“I don’t think so,” she said, glancing down to the pistol she held against his abdomen. 

“I have underestimated you,” he noted. “But you are beginning to shake. The cold will render you defenseless soon.” 

She saw that he was correct. The temperature was dropping rapidly now as the frozen walls overcame the last of the stored heat in the room. “You, t-too,” she pointed out. “Which will it be, Saren? Ally or enemy?”

He stared at her for a long moment and then said, “You truly believe that you can defeat them?”

“I believe that I’ll t-try my d-damnedest,” she said as the cold settled into her bones and made her clench her jaw to keep from biting her tongue.

“You’ll sound more convincing when you aren’t about to freeze to death,” he said and, with a long-suffering sigh, began to remove his armor.

“W-w-what are you d-d-doing?” she asked, wrapping her arms around herself and getting up to pace. She needed to move. She was freezing. It was past time to go for the emergency blanket in her armor.

“Shared body heat will keep us alive for longer,” he pointed out. “I put off more heat than you do.”

“B-b-because turians are designed t-t-to release heat, not absorb it. You’re s-signing your own death warrant,” she said. “I’ll leach all of yours away and then what will y-you do?”

He pulled out a thin silver sheet like the one she carried. It wouldn’t be enough in these temperatures if either of them were alone, but their combined heat would hopefully see them through. She wondered where Garrus and Liara were and if they were faring better. She desperately hoped that Benezia hadn’t gotten the better of them. Her train of thought derailed when Saren began to strip his undersuit. She’d seen Garrus in the showers after missions, but after the first time when they’d stared at each other with open curiosity, they didn’t generally look. It wasn’t that turians were unattractive. She just didn’t want to see the guy who was quickly becoming her best friend naked even if all of their bits were hidden away when not in use.

Saren was very different from Garrus. He was taller and leaner. His pale, metallic plates clearly showed the multitude of scars he’d accumulated over the years. Several of them were even lighter than the rest and she wondered why. Though commonly stated to possess an exoskeleton or carapace, the plates on their bodies were more like thick, tough skin than bone or shell. It could be punctured, though not easily, and she knew from patching Garrus up enough times that there were places on their hides that were rough to the touch and others that were surprisingly soft. She doubted that any part of Saren was soft, though. Garrus looked tough even out of his armor. Saren looked lethal. If she’d had any doubt that turians were apex predators, those doubts were thoroughly dispelled upon seeing him in the…hide. He looked even more predatory out of his armor than he did in it. She could easily picture him flying across Palaven in pursuit of prey. When he gave her an expectant look, she felt like she was that prey.

“Your armor is doing little more than transferring the cold to your body,” he said. “Dispose of it.”

She raised an eyebrow and said, “You w-w-want me to get naked? With y-you?”

He huffed and said archly, “Believe me, desire has nothing to do with it, human. Would you prefer to freeze out of a misguided sense of modesty?”

“No,” she said in resignation and began to strip out of her armor while he shook out the emergency blanket. She pulled her own out and wrapped it around her as soon as her underarmor had been removed.

He huffed again and pulled her to him, opening the blankets so that they were pressed up against each other. She stifled a sigh of relief at the glorious heat radiating off of him and attempted to turn around. He stopped her. “Your organs have more bone and muscle to protect them from the back. Your core does not and neither does mine. I hadn’t expected reticence from a human. Your kind tends to be particularly lewd.”

“I’m military. I have no problem being nude around the people I fight alongside,” she said as he sat and pulled her into his lap so that she was straddling him. She was glad to note that his groin plates were tightly closed and had left her underwear on in any case. She wasn’t stripping down that far. “An alien who was trying to kill me less than an hour ago? That’s a different story altogether.”

“I agreed to an alliance when I broke faith with Sovereign,” he said. “I do not tolerate manipulation and that is precisely what indoctrination is.”

“We’ll see,” she said. “I still don’t trust you not to slit my throat.”

He held up his hands and retracted his talons. She hadn’t known he could do that. He gave a frustrated hum and pulled her closer. “Relax, Shepard,” he said. “I have no interest in you as a woman and I won’t kill you now.” He told himself he wasn’t lying about the first and Sovereign demanded that he lie about the latter. The Reaper’s voice felt further away when his focus was on Shepard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know charge doesn't come until the second game, but I've put it here for purposes of the story. I couldn't come up with another way to get her separated from her team and it's my preferred fighting style. I didn't, however, add nova. I've also assigned Saren's biotic abilities myself as the attacks he actually uses are either generic biotic attacks or tech and I couldn't find a list of his biotic abilities.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NSFW. Getting right to the smut in this one.

Saren hated humans. He’d hated humans since the fiasco with Jack Harper had resulted in Desolas’ death by his own hand. He’d fought them in the Relay 314 Incident and had found nothing to recommend them but the sheer strength of the military. Since the cessation of hostilities between their races, the humans had shown themselves to be individualistic, entitled, loud, dishonest, inconsiderate, largely xenophobic, obscene, and proud without merit. They didn’t have the intellect of the salarians, the dignity of the asari, the discipline of the turians, the business acumen of the volus, the brutality of the krogan, or the technical skills of the quarians. They built decent ships and had a formidable military despite their lack of discipline, but less than two percent of their population was military. That idea was deplorable to Saren. They were adaptable and they were somewhat creative, but those traits were not enough to warrant concession to the demands they made. They should have been grateful simply to be added to the Council races and granted an embassy while many, like the drell and quarians, still were not, but nothing was ever sufficient to satisfy the humans’ grasping. 

This one, however, was different. Shepard didn’t lie even when one would have served her better than the truth. He knew her service history. As he’d told her before the Council, he’d been given all of Nihlus’ records after Nihlus had died. _Murdered by my hand on orders from Sovereign. I killed my own protégé. I shot him in the back like a coward. Shepard is right to call me craven._ He couldn’t think about that right now. That was something best left to face when he was alone. Shepard was a safe topic and he turned his mind back to her. She’d been born and raised in space. She had survived the thresher maw attack on Akuze. She had no problem leading an interspecies crew, and from what he’d seen, actually preferred aliens to humans on her team. She wasn’t xenophobic.

The second member had changed on occasion, but she carried the Vakarian fledgling with her on every mission. Yet, the way she’d looked at Saren when he’d disrobed had been too curious for her to be intimately familiar with turian anatomy. The two weren’t lovers. Vakarian was young and hotheaded, but he wasn’t stupid. He had been one of the first to pick up on Saren’s behavior and took it as a personal affront to their people’s values. Saren had to agree now that he was seeing it all clearly. The C-Sec officer was intelligent, devoted, and held tightly to the turian value system outside of the brashness that stemmed from his youth. If he had given his loyalty so completely to Shepard, there had to be a reason. 

She put her crew before herself. She’d risked her life for that of her human teammate and had left her behind only when she had no other choice. She was willing to give her life for the good of the galaxy. She wasn’t individualistic. She’d turned down promotions which she felt she hadn’t earned and had staunchly refused to utilize her mother’s name to get ahead. She had reason to be proud of her service and accomplishments. He had seen firsthand that she was a formidable foe. She wasn’t entitled. She _was_ loud but it was a loudness that came of passion and conviction rather than simply a demand to be heard without regard to what she had to say. 

When Nihlus had told him he’d put her name forward for Spectre candidacy, Saren had found business on Arcturus Station in order to observe her. He’d hoped to find a reason to convince Nihlus to withdraw his recommendation. However, he’d found nothing. She followed orders. She attempted diplomacy but didn’t hesitate to use violence when necessary. She was intelligent and creative in her solutions to problems—a few of which he himself had caused for her. She didn’t seem to indulge in drug use and she drank sparingly and never enough to result in true intoxication, something of which he approved. She maintained strict control over herself and was almost as disciplined as a turian. Unlike many of her kind, she didn’t advertise herself. The clothing in her closets primarily consisted of various military uniforms and the small amount of civilian clothing she had was tasteful. 

Even when she joined her friends at a bar, she had dressed modestly in a pantsuit that made her stand out from the scantily-clad females who made up most of the establishment’s clientele. She had arrived alone and gone home alone. He’d found reference to a former boyfriend on one of her datapads, but no evidence of a current lover in her quarters and she had not met with one in the time that he’d watched her. Turians had a more relaxed view of casual sex than humans did and none of the ridiculous restrictions the Alliance put onto their people; but, after seeing the sheer number of human women who threw themselves at Nihlus, it was refreshing to witness a human who didn’t give herself away to the first person she found attractive. Nihlus had mentioned to him that the _Normandy_ had communal shower facilities like a turian ship and that she was one of the few humans who didn’t leave the moment he came in, so her statement about lacking modesty among allies rang true and yet she’d deliberately maintained the clothing that covered her genitalia when stripping down with him. 

He had developed a grudging admiration for her while observing her and had reluctantly decided that he would find no reason beyond her humanity to deny her the opportunity to become a Spectre. Then, on Eden Prime, she had wiped out his geth and husks with only two people where an entire squad had fallen prey to them. She’d survived the beacon and had put things together swiftly enough to present a case to the Council that would have held up had she been anything but human and accusing anyone but him. He had respected the way she’d stood up to him without fear. He intimidated almost everyone he met even through holo, but she had not been intimidated. She’d pursued him with a single-minded determination and had tracked him far more easily than he had anticipated. 

Then, on Virmire, he’d seen her in person. She’d been unprepared for what she would find but had laid waste to his facility nonetheless. When she’d spoken to him, her voice had rung with conviction despite the lack of secondary vocals whose absence implied dishonesty, or at the very least, reticence in his own culture. She had been absolutely certain of her own rightness and had all but convinced him to join her when Sovereign had intervened and ordered him to kill her. He’d had her throat in his hands and even then had seen no fear in her eyes. She was calculating, looking for a weakness, even as she struggled for breath. The moment she’d found it, she had sprung. He’d been distracted by the sight of her, drawn to her, and had imagined that her skin had burned him even through the prosthetic arm he bore. 

Respect had morphed into something he did not want. The things he felt for this human were ridiculous. She was not the human version of himself without Desolas’ death or Sovereign’s input. She didn’t see into his spirit. They were nothing alike. She didn’t _understand_ him. He couldn’t possibly feel something for her which he’d never felt even for one of his own kind. She was charismatic, that was true enough. There was something that made others want to follow her and it was that trait that had affected him so deeply. It had to be. She was a _human_. He found her very race revolting. 

She began to relax and he noticed the soft scent of her as her skin gradually warmed and her tense muscles stopped shaking. She was starting to produce heat on her own again as the blankets reflected his back onto them. He realized that he was almost comfortable. Her breathing deepened and evened out as exhaustion and pain finally overtook her. He followed not long after, floating in a place between sleep and wakefulness where he would still register any change to his environment that could present a threat, but which allowed him to rest. He thought it likely that she was drifting in the same place. When no threat came and he made no move against her, she slipped deeper into sleep and he followed. He never went far enough to allow himself to become unaware of his surroundings as he firmly believed that nowhere was safe and had honed his instincts into weapons of their own. For lack of a better place to put them, he allowed his arms to come to rest around her, and to his surprise, she rested herself more fully against him. His plates couldn’t be very comfortable against her skin, but she didn’t seem to notice.

When he woke, he was surprised and dismayed to find that he had no idea of how much time had passed. The bitterly cold, darkened room gave no clues. There was a woman in his arms, and for a moment, it struck him as odd enough to be confusing. He had not gotten true rest in years and he’d clearly done so deeply enough to forget her presence. He hadn’t been with a woman in longer than he’d like to admit. There was a dearth of turian females on the Citadel or in the places he generally went and he had no desire for those of any other species. At least, that was what he’d thought until he’d woken up with a woman who was far softer than anything he’d experienced pressed up against him. Her head was tucked into his shoulder and her warm breath whispered across his chest. She was still asleep. 

He attempted to stretch his muscles without jarring her. The medigel he’d injected the night before had worked on his broken spur and its pain had faded. She made a small sound of distress, and without stopping to think about what he was doing, he smoothed his hand over her back to soothe her. His fingers encountered puckered flesh and he recognized the pattern. Her back was splashed with acid burns. She had not escaped the maws unscathed. That explained her reaction, however outwardly mild, to the rachni and their acid. Judging by the extent of her scarring, the maw had been close enough that the acid had still been in a tight stream rather than splattered from distance. She was fortunate to have survived. 

Once he began touching her, he couldn’t seem to force himself to stop. Telling himself it was mere curiosity, he explored the line of her spine, the strength in her shoulders, the limber musculature of her arms and legs. Her muscles were hard, toned, and strong even when she was relaxed in sleep. Her skin was impossibly soft but for the lines of her scars and the callouses on her hands from over a decade of holding weapons. She was smaller than he’d realized, though, and it made her seem fragile in a way he’d never noticed when she was armored and alert. The force of her personality made her seem larger than life. Her physical fragility did not, however, equate to weakness.

Shepard did not come to consciousness in a rush as she normally did but gradually. She felt a vague sense of the potential for danger, but it was mitigated by the pleasant sensations that guided her from nightmare to something closer to restfulness. She was cocooned in warmth and, while her resting place felt harder even than her wide cot aboard the _Normandy_ , it wasn’t entirely uncomfortable or without give. Gentle hands stroked her skin and she realized that it was the sensation of those hands on her that had called her toward wakefulness. Those hands made her feel surprisingly safe and that felt wrong somehow, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. For the first time since Akuze, she hadn’t woken gasping from recurrent nightmares in the middle of the night. The dark that surrounded her made her think that it was, however, still the night cycle and she didn’t force herself into wakefulness. 

The hands hesitated over her waist as if unsure of how to proceed, but the one touching her seemed reluctant to break contact. It had been a long time since she’d woken up with a lover and it was more pleasant than she remembered, even if their position was somewhat awkward for sleep. She felt rather than heard his groan and the muffled curse from above her. The voice sounded familiar, but she couldn’t place it. The thrill of alarm that went through her was softened by the gentle brush of his three-fingered hands over her skin. A turian, then, she decided. One-night stands weren’t her style, but she’d been under a lot of strain lately and must have joined the others and indulged far more than normal. She hoped it wasn’t Garrus. That could be awkward later, though if he kept touching her like this, she might not protest much. 

Heat began to build within her as his hands settled over her hips and traced the outline of her bones. She nuzzled deeper into his chest and let out a contented sigh. Wherever she was, she felt no desire to move. She hadn’t felt this peaceful in months. His hands trailed down the outside of her legs and circled the ball of her knees before drifting upward along her inner thighs. Definitely a lover. Her breathing grew shallow and she couldn’t suppress the small moan that slipped out as his hands went higher. Even as they stilled, she felt his plates shift and the oddity of the sensation was overwhelmed by the feel of his hard length gliding along her core as he slid out. She gasped and her nails raked over plated skin. 

What in the name of Palaven was he doing? He’d meant simply to indulge his curiosity. While he’d been cautious of her waist, he’d obviously misjudged the locations of her erogenous zones, given the sound she’d made when he’d touched the inside of her legs. He had no point of reference but turians and had tried to avoid areas that would be sexual on one of his kind, but it had been foolish to assume that they would be the same with a different species. That, at least, was an honest mistake. The erection pressing against her hot center now was not and he couldn’t deny that he’d been straining against his plates even before her soft moan had stripped him of his discipline. She rolled her pelvis slightly and he couldn’t stop his reactionary purr. 

He wanted her. He would be lying if he said he didn’t. The idea of desiring a human was disturbing, but this wasn’t just any human. This was Shepard and she was the closest person he had to an equal. Not only that, but she was proving to be his salvation. He still despised her kind, but she had transcended her humanity. How strange that he would find a kindred spirit in one so different. Her mouth was on his chest and he felt her tongue dip into the gap between his plates to glide over the sensitive hide there. At this sign of her willingness, he finally allowed himself to slide his hands along her waist. Her hips were too slim to give the proper ratio, but her waist was undeniably trim and muscular. She rocked her pelvis again and he reached down to shift her undergarment to the side. He wanted to simply slice through it, but he didn’t know what purpose it served and didn’t wish to destroy something that might be important. 

He didn’t fully know what to expect, but the wet heat he found was oddly enticing. She had no plates to coax open, for which he was grateful since he was judging his actions by her responses. He prided himself on excelling at any undertaking he attempted and that applied to sex as well. He was generally a considerate, if detached and not particularly gentle, lover and lacking the knowledge of how to please his partner was both unnerving and challenging. A part of him reveled at the fact that Commander Shepard herself was rubbing herself against his hand in an obvious signal of desire. He followed the silent direction of her body and slid a finger against her. He needed to get at least an idea of the terrain before continuing and her moan let him know that he was doing something right. She trailed her hands down his back and when she reached his waist, he groaned into her strange fringe. She took that as encouragement and remained there for a time before moving further. He slid a finger into her in response and her nails scraped against the dip of his hips. 

When her hand with its too-many fingers slid down his length and wrapped around him, he clenched his teeth and had to bite back a groan. Even with the callouses on her skin, it was far softer than anything to which he was accustomed. He resisted the urge to thrust up into her hand. She made a sound of protest when he withdrew his finger, but when his hand brushed hers, she released him and shifted to allow him to position himself at her entrance.

She cried out when he pulled her down onto him and it was all he could do not to echo the sound. She was different from a turian female. They had rougher skin and harder muscle with less play in it and their natural lubrication was less viscous. The friction here wasn’t what he was used to, but that wasn’t necessarily detrimental. She was almost painfully hot, slick, tight, and she conformed to him like a glove. He realized that he’d underestimated her musculature when she clenched around him and he lifted her so that he could experience that glorious slide again. She seemed to expect that and was already moving with him, so he assumed that this in and out glide was how humans copulated. He was not averse to that if it meant feeling her clasp around him. Her hands moved as though she was as uncertain as he about where to go, so he placed one against the underside of his fringe. She stroked and then raked her nails against them and he rewarded her with an involuntary sharp intake of breath. She repeated the motion and then pressed into the sensitive spot just below his fringe. A part of him wondered how she knew to do that, but the rest didn’t care as long as she continued to lavish attention on it. 

He slid out of her again and then pushed into her with a bit more enthusiasm. Her nails dug into his hide. He experimented with pressure and speed until he found a rhythm that had her gasping and arching into the hand he’d placed on her back to support her. Her free hand moved to his waist as she stroked his fringe. He thrust into her forcefully as he allowed his talons to dance over her skin, but carefully as he was conscious of their sharpness. She cried out but the sound was not one of distress, so he did it again. She began to supplicate her deity and he smiled with the feral pleasure of one who’d managed to reduce his partner to a writhing mess. That this partner was Shepard made it all the better. He wanted to roll her over and take her on her knees, but doing so would dislodge their makeshift shelter. Instead, he settled for holding her waist as she rode him from above. Her head was thrown back, baring her throat, and he heard Sovereign whisper that this was the perfect time to strike. He ignored its insistence. She raked her nails down his back and he fought the urge to slam into her over and over again.

He felt amazing, like nothing she’d ever experienced. The roll of his hips, the slide of his ridged length inside her, the cautious scrape of his talons over her back and waist, the friction of his tough hide against her chest, the heat of his breath on her exposed neck, and the dark intimacy of their cocoon all served to drive her to the point of madness. It had to be madness, for when her hands encountered the ports on the back of his neck and she realized exactly who he was and remembered how they’d gotten here, she merely moaned his name. He shuddered beneath her and his hands clamped firmly around her waist as he breathed her name into her neck. His hot, textured tongue slid over the pulse point in her throat, but she couldn’t say for certain if the shiver that ran through her was comprised more of fear or desire. She only knew that she wanted more.

He let her guide his hand down to her center and felt her teeth clamp over his collar when his thumb brushed a nub that must have been a collection of nerve endings, for her resulting moan was nothing short of wanton. She clenched around him and the tight, hot embrace made his head spin. He could understand now why so many turians agreed to conjugate with human females. Where turian females were designed for successful reproduction with pleasure a secondary function, human females seemed to be designed more for the act itself. With every stroke of her body around his, Sovereign’s voice was driven further into the recesses of his mind as his focus centered to an almost painful degree on her. He had to resist the primal urge to bury teeth and talons into her soft skin, to mark her and claim her as he would do with one of his own kind. 

Her cries rose in intensity as she tightened improbably around him. Her teeth and hands were locked onto his collar as he drove into her with enough force that he was certain he had to be injuring her. He couldn’t bring himself to care. She wasn’t objecting and he could just make out his name in the muffled sounds that tore from her. Her breathing was fast and ragged. Her pace changed and quickened as her head fell back, exposing her throat to him once more. With a groan, he placed his teeth against it, enough to threaten, enough to announce his dominance over her, but without the pressure that would break her skin and fill his mouth with her life’s blood. It was as much an instinctive claim of protection as it was of possession. He was forcing her to trust that he would not harm her and the fact that she did not attempt to pull away or stop him was a surrender to that trust. 

The scrape of his teeth against her throat and the obvious control with which he held himself ignited something in Shepard. She shuddered and rolled her pelvis against him, seeking that final push that would send her over the edge. “Saren, please!” His snarl vibrated against her skin and his arm banded around her waist to pull her further into him. The change in angle was all she needed and she called out his name as her release swept over her. He tore his mouth from her and snapped his teeth in her ear as his talons sank into the skin on his hips and he growled. She felt him begin to swell and he buried himself in her, pulsating in time with her convulsions. 

“Spirits, Shepard,” he exhaled. His bright blue eyes shone as his forehead came to rest against hers. 

She gave a shaky laugh and said, “What happened to having no interest in me as a woman?”

“Were you unwilling?” he asked, suddenly tense.

“No,” she said and felt him relax. “Just curious.”

“Good,” he sighed in relief. “Good. I do have honor, such as it is, Shepard. I would not knowingly take you against your will. I believe a combination of curiosity and instinct may have taken over.” It wasn’t the full truth but it was close enough. He couldn’t tell her how his feelings toward her had changed. She wouldn’t believe him. He didn’t entirely believe it himself.

They were saved from further discussion by the hiss of the door. He moved swiftly, shielding her with his body as he drew his pistol and aimed for the intruder. The Vakarian fledgling and Benezia’s daughter, looking a bit worse for wear but determined, entered with guns drawn. Benezia’s daughter glowed blue with her biotics and Vakarian snarled when he noticed the cybernetic blue eyes glowing beneath the emergency blanket. “What did you do to her, you son of a bitch?” Vakarian demanded, aiming his assault rifle at Saren’s head. 

Saren brought up a biotic barrier as Shepard said from beneath him, “Hold your fire! I’m all right!”

“Shepard?” the asari asked, eyes widening as she took in the scene.

Shepard said, “The heating unit in my hardsuit is dead.”

“The heat’s back on,” Vakarian told her. “It’s chilly out here but it won’t kill you. What the hell are you doing in a nest with _Saren_?” The other turian’s tone was venomous.

“Surviving,” she answered. “Look, it’s a long story. Let me get dressed and I’ll brief you. A lot has changed.” Despite being naked, pinned down on the floor by a heavy turian who’d been her enemy only hours before, and still locked with said enemy, her voice was authoritative.

Vakarian scented the air and his eyes narrowed on Saren. “Shepard,” he growled warningly. “Did he…are you…”

“It was a stressful situation, Vakarian,” Saren said, though he knew that what had transpired had little to do with stress relief. “I did not harm her.”

“I don’t give a damn how stressful it was,” Vakarian said. “She wouldn’t agree to that with _you_.”

Shepard cleared her throat and said, “At ease, Garrus. He’s telling the truth.”

“Shepard,” Vakarian said with confusion and betrayal ringing in his voice.

“Don’t ‘Shepard’ me,” she said firmly. “Liara get me my damn clothes, please, and then give us the room for a moment.”

Vakarian’s subvocals brightened for a moment and he said, “Shepard, are you under duress?”

“No!” she shouted. “You people are so damn nosy! I appreciate your concern. I’m fine. I’m just a bit, um…” He felt her face press into his chest and was somewhat amused at her obvious discomfiture.

“Tied in,” Saren supplied. Vakarian’s mandibles splayed in shock. Saren snarled, “Out, fledgling! Allow your commander her dignity.”

Shepard adjusted the emergency blanket so that she could see out. She glared at Vakarian. “Go!”

When the asari and the other turian had stepped back out of the room, Saren looked down at Shepard. Her face was bright and she wouldn’t look at him. He gently stroked her strange fringe from her face before withdrawing from her and standing to dress. He was fortunate that her companions trusted her enough not to shoot him on sight as his barrier was not as strong as the shielding in his armor, and while it would guard against projectiles for a time, it would not have prevented Vakarian from moving into it and slitting his throat. It would be wise to remain armored around that one. He heard a rustle behind him as Shepard straightened her undergarments and rose to don her own hardsuit. They didn’t speak as they dressed and her commander’s face was fully in place by the time she’d completed the task. Their interlude was over.


	3. Chapter 3

She called the others back into the room and placed herself between them and him. He would have found it insulting had it been anyone but her doing so. He did not need protection, especially from a human. However, he knew that she was making a statement in exposing her back to him in front of her crew and allowed her the display. She explained their conversation from the night before, the power outage, and their truce. Though the others clearly knew what had transpired between them, she didn’t mention it. The other turian and the asari listened to her with wide eyes that shifted from her to him. When she finished, Vakarian said, “How can you trust that he isn’t lying or going to turn on you? Even if he is a victim of indoctrination and fighting it, how do you know he’ll be able to keep it up? What happens if Sovereign regains control over him?”

“Have I steered us wrong yet, Garrus?” she asked. “I’m aware of the risks. We’ll be careful. But this isn’t about vengeance. This is about stopping the Reapers. He understands them better than we do. That makes him a valuable asset. Now, report.”

Vakarian glanced at the asari and said, “Benezia got away. We took down her commandos, but she escaped when the power went out. We used the commandos’ heating units when ours went down and got to work restoring the power. The cold has made the rachni sluggish and seems to have killed most of them. There is something you need to see, though.”

They led her into the lab where Benezia had last been. The bodies of several asari commandos littered the floor and he raised a brow plate. He was impressed. Benezia’s commando unit had been one of the best. For the two of them on their own to take them down while simultaneously holding off the matriarch was quite an accomplishment. Many of them sported headshot wounds. He’d underestimated the fledgling. 

Shepard stopped in front of the tank holding the rachni queen. Saren had yet to see her himself. Shepard was startled when the queen commandeered the body of an asari, but conversed with her like it was nothing out of the ordinary. He supposed that after having a conversation with a Reaper and the thorian, little could truly surprise her now. Vakarian advocated for killing her while Benezia’s daughter seemed to support her release. Shepard looked at him and said to her companions, “I have enough to explain to the crew and the Council without having to also justify releasing the rachni back out onto the galaxy. Wrex would probably defect if I did and we need him more than we need her.” Vakarian nodded his approval as she activated the button to kill the queen. He almost thought he saw regret on her face.

\---

Saren had heard of the _Normandy_ , but had not seen it aside from the short glimpse on Virmire. Shepard led him through Port Hanshan and out to the docks. She left him in the CIC with Benezia’s daughter and Vakarian as guards, though he didn’t know whether she thought she was guarding the crew from him or him from the crew. The other two didn’t seem to know, either. A few minutes later, the sound of angry voices could be heard from the briefing room. He heard the krogan roar and then a human male shout, “He killed Ash, Commander!” 

“Sounds like they don’t like the idea of bringing you on board any more than we do, Arterius,” Vakarian said. Saren ignored him as he looked over the ship. There were parts of it that were foreign where things he expected to see were either in the wrong place or nonexistent and the lines of the ship itself were clearly designed with humans in mind, but there were other things, like the placement of the command center, that were familiar.

Shepard’s voice rang out from the other room. “Enough! All of you, _stand down_!” Silence fell instantly. It was another hour before the crew filed out of the briefing room. The pilot muttered something under his breath as he limped up to the cockpit and the human male fixed him with a hateful glare. The krogan eyed him up and down and scowled while the quarian was unreadable behind her mask. Shepard’s voice filtered out over the ship-wide comm, apprising the rest of the crew of his presence and ordering the information classified. He was amused by her order that anyone found attempting to cause him harm would be court-martialed or airlocked at her discretion and that any issues be brought directly to her for resolution. “He’s on our side now. If that changes, I’ll kill him myself,” she finished.

“And if she doesn’t, I will,” Vakarian muttered.

When she joined them, Saren said, “I believe that Officer Vakarian has something to say and it would be prudent to resolve this prior to continuing with the mission.”

She led them back into the briefing room and said, “All right, Garrus. Say your piece.”

Vakarian turned to him with a snarl and said, “After everything you’ve done, you deserve to be shot on sight, not welcomed to the crew and placed under Shepard’s protection. You murdered your own protégé and caused the death of one of our crewmates. Ash was a good woman and she deserved better.”

“People rarely get what they deserve, Vakarian, whether for good or ill,” Saren said. “The galaxy cares not one whit how ‘good’ or ‘evil’ a person is when deciding their fate.”

“That doesn’t change the fact that she was a hero and you are a traitor to your race and everything you were supposed to stand for,” Vakarian growled. “Shepard may forgive you, but I do not.”

Shepard stepped forward and said, “Garrus, can you honestly say that faced with the knowledge of the Reapers and familiarity with the Council and their refusal to face unpleasant facts, left to find a way to protect the galaxy alone, that you would have refused the offer of an alliance if one was extended and you genuinely believed that there was no way to defeat them? Because I can’t. We have the benefit of having both proof and support. He didn’t.”

“He didn’t try,” Garrus said.

“Do you think anyone would have believed him if he’d come before the Council spouting off about a race of ancient, sentient machines bent on harvesting all life in the galaxy?” she asked. “Or would Councilor Valern have shaken his head in disappointment while Councilor Sparatus made air quotes and snarky remarks about ‘Reapers’ and Tevos said that ‘Saren’s years of distinguished service have clearly placed him under a great deal of strain. Spectre Arterius, perhaps you should consider a leave of absence. A vacation would serve you well and dispel these far-fetched ideas from your mind.’”

Saren snorted in amusement at her accurate portrayal of each of the Councilors. She’d clearly spent enough time around them to know how they thought and reacted. Aloud, he said, “That is almost word for word what was said when I did go to them upon finding Sovereign for the first time.”

She looked surprised but cocked an eyebrow and said, “Well, Garrus?”

“He could have approached the Hierarchy, spoken with the Primarch,” Garrus said.

“And if it works with turians anything like it does with humans, they’d have asked why the Council hadn’t authorized him to act, called up Sparatus, and been told that he was crazy,” she said. Vakarian shifted his feet. He knew as well as Saren that it would have happened in precisely that way. Politics were politics regardless of species. “That’s what I thought. So…what then? Do you think any of the other races would have listened after the Council and your own people shot him down? The Alliance wouldn’t have, especially after the war between our people and given his reputation. The asari wouldn’t. Tevos speaks with their voice. The salarians _might_ have but do you really think that one turian and STG could take on the Reapers alone? The salarians are scientists and infiltrators. We need fleets. We need the turians and the Alliance. Hell, we need the quarians if we can get them. We need the whole damn galaxy. We stand together or we die together. So, tell me, Garrus,” she said, advancing on him, “what would you have done if all of your other options were exhausted and you were alone?”

“I…would have attempted to broker a treaty for my people,” Vakarian answered, sounding defeated. 

“And so would I,” she said. “Even if I knew it probably wouldn’t work, anything would be preferable to standing by knowing what was coming and doing nothing. So cut him a little bit of damn slack and try to imagine for one damn moment that now that he has allies and support, he just might be willing to stand up and fight against them. You’re dismissed. Saren, stay. We need to contact the Council.”

“You’re going to tell them I’m here?” he asked.

“It’s not like I can hide you,” she said. “Too many people on this ship know about you. Someone will talk. I wouldn’t be surprised if Kaidan isn’t reporting me to Anderson and Udina right now.”

“Anderson will pull you in,” he warned. “He loathes me after the Camala debacle.”

Shepard crossed her arms and said, “All right. I’ve heard his side of it. What’s yours?”

He said, “I had learned of an artifact—Sovereign, as it turned out—that I was attempting to track down. A batarian named Edan Had’dah was the key to locating it and he, in turn, was searching for a human woman. I leaked information about the woman’s whereabouts as a trap for Had’dah and she was captured. I was able to track her to Camala but Ambassador Goyle insisted that Anderson be brought along for evaluation. I was clear about our objectives: locating Had’dah and the data was primary, rescue of the human was secondary. However, Anderson was romantically involved with the woman and had no business being there. Upon our arrival, he broke off to find her. He was sloppy, emotional, and alerted the guards to our presence. I was forced to create a diversion by destroying the refinery. I went after Had’dah, recovered the data, killed him, and left Anderson and the woman with the Alliance. 

“I reported all of this to the Council along with my recommendation that he be removed from Spectre candidacy. A Spectre cannot allow personal feelings to jeopardize a mission. Because of his haste, innocent people died that would not have had to had he stuck to the plan. Is one woman’s life worth the loss of many more, Shepard? We might even have been able to save her had he cooperated, and without destroying the refinery in the process. His humanity was a mark against him in my mind but, despite his continued assertions, it is not why I spoke against him. The Council ordered me to assess him. I did so honestly. My personal views regarding his species were irrelevant.”

“I understand,” she said. “Anderson is like a father to me. I care deeply about him and respect him immensely, but he is still fallible.” As much as she didn’t want to believe Saren, his story made more logical sense than Anderson’s insistence that Saren’s dislike of him was personal and that he’d deliberately sabotaged his entry into the Spectres. Better men than he had been brought to their knees and made irrational by love of a woman. She didn’t doubt that Saren’s dislike of him had made him more outspoken, but she suspected that he would have said the same even about a turian. She knew that she would have done the same if the situation was reversed. He was also correct about Anderson’s reaction. 

She activated the comm and placed a call. “Admiral Hackett,” she said.

“Commander Shepard. What can I do for you?” Hackett responded.

“I have a situation and I need your help,” she said. “Saren Arterius has agreed to join our cause.”

“How the hell did you pull that off?” Hackett asked.

“Very carefully, sir,” she answered. “He is still under the effects of the indoctrination but is fighting it. He’s provided me with intel that could help us stop Sovereign. However, I am going to have to alert the Council to his presence and I believe that Captain Anderson and Ambassador Udina will attempt to ground me. We need to get to the Prothean archives on Ilos.”

“That requires going into the Terminus Systems, Commander,” he pointed out. “Any sighting of an Alliance vessel there could lead to all-out war.”

“The _Normandy_ ’s stealth systems can get us there undetected,” she said. “I wouldn’t ask for your help in this if I didn’t believe it was absolutely necessary, Admiral.”

“You’re sure he can be trusted, Commander?” Hackett asked.

“As sure as I can be, sir,” she answered. “As I told the crew, if he tries to defect, I’ll kill him myself. We need him, sir.”

Hackett sighed and said, “All right, Commander. I’ll do what I can to ease your way. I can’t make any promises about Udina, though.”

She heard Saren snort and said, “With all due respect, sir, the only certain thing about Udina is that he’s going to do whatever he thinks will ingratiate him with the Council and he’s going to show his ass to the rest of us while he does it.”

Hackett laughed and said, “Agreed. Hackett out.”

“Your ambassador doesn’t sound popular,” Saren noted.

She sighed. “Unfortunately, humanity’s representative is all too representative of the absolute worst in humanity,” she said. “He’s entitled, immature, demanding, rude, power-hungry, selfish, and disingenuous. With him as our spokesperson, it’s no wonder the other races think we have no business on the Council. Hell, _I_ don’t think we have any business on the Council. What have we done to earn it? We demand concession after concession and yet medigel is our only real contribution to the galactic community and even that wasn’t something we designed for anyone but ourselves. The other races had to work to modify it for widespread use. Within my lifetime, there was still a time when humans had no idea that the Council even existed and yet we feel we deserve a seat on it alongside races that have worked together for centuries and before other races that have been here longer and done more? Bullshit. But just try to tell Udina that and he’ll squawk and call you an anti-human race traitor. In some ways, he’s as bad as Cerberus.”

“You continue to surprise me, Shepard,” he said.

“I’m not the only one who feels this way, you know,” she said. “Your hatred of humans in general washes over a lot of individuals who are nothing like what you think. You’ve let a few bad apples spoil the whole barrel.”

“Human idioms are irritating,” he said.

“It makes perfect sense if you’ve ever seen a barrel of apples,” she said. “A few bad examples have detrimentally affected your view of my species as a whole. In short, you’re racist, Saren.”

“I have never let my view of humanity stop me from performing my duties when they were involved,” he said stiffly.

“No,” she said, “but if you hadn’t been so determined to put us down, would finding that artifact have been so important? If you’d been afraid that it was a danger, you’d have told the Council about it before finding Sovereign. That tells me you’d thought it was something you could use, something powerful enough to give you what you wanted. You were a Spectre. You had credits, resources, almost unlimited authority. What could you want that would require something especially powerful? Dominance over humans, perhaps? Tell me, would Sovereign have been able to use this Had’dah the way it used you?”

“No,” he said. “I was a perfect target.”

“So, yeah. Thanks for that,” she said wryly. 

“Are we going to talk about what happened this morning?” he asked. In his experience, women generally wanted to talk about it after and he wished to deter her from this line of questioning. He wasn’t accustomed to being called upon to justify the morality of his actions. Even his private introspections generally revolved around critiquing his own performance and looking for ways in which he could have improved. He knew that he needed to do some serious contemplation, but now was not the time. There were years of choices, decisions, and drives that had led him to this point. It was not something that could be dissected, evaluated, and resolved in a single conversation or even a few series of them, and while he hadn’t expected Shepard’s insight, he still didn’t expect her to be able to completely understand. He didn’t yet completely understand it himself.

“No,” she said. “Right now, I’m going to talk to the Council.”

“What do you expect from them?” he asked.

“The same thing I always get from them,” she said darkly. “If they think it will make them look better, they’ll have you brought in immediately and held for trial. If not, they’ll let you stay under my authority until the mission is complete and then they’ll have you brought in and held for trial. It will largely depend on whether Sparatus is willing to stand up to Valern. Tevos will defer to whomever she needs something from more. Hell, Saren, you know them better than I do. You can speak for yourself. It might look better coming from you. Gods know they don’t believe a damn thing I say without concrete evidence. They may have made me a Spectre, but they don’t listen any better than they did before.”

She activated the QEC and a moment later, all three of the councilors appeared. Tevos said, “Commander Shepard. We have not yet received your report from Noveria.”

“We just returned. I will make a full report when we’re finished here,” Shepard said. “Councilors, there is something we need to discuss.”

Valern was passive, Tevos looked shocked, and Sparatus was smug as she explained the terms of their alliance. Valern was the first to speak. “Commander, how can you be certain that this is not a ploy or attempt at misdirection?”

She said, “That would make me more valuable to the machines alive than dead, valuable enough that they consider the possibility of successfully indoctrinating me worth the risk of allowing me to continue my mission against them. I’m telling you right now, if I start singing their praises or talking about anything but utterly destroying every single one of them with excessive force, kill me. Don’t lock me up. Don’t try to make me better. Just kill me. He could be attempting to find out what we know and report back to Sovereign, but I know less than he does at this point and he knows it. I know the next move because he told me and Liara confirmed it through the vision from the Prothean beacon. We likely would have figured it out for ourselves, but the truth remains that we are still behind the curve on this. Saren could change that.”

Sparatus said, “I think Arterius should be allowed the opportunity to speak for himself.”

Saren nodded and stepped forward. “Councilors,” he said, “my previous actions were the result of indoctrination by the Reapers. Once Commander Shepard made it clear that I was under Sovereign’s influence, I was able to fight its control. I am myself once more.” He didn’t think it necessary to mention that he could still hear the Reaper in his mind. Shepard knew and that was enough. The Council couldn’t do anything about it. Shepard would kill him if he allowed it to overtake him again. “I wish to join the fight against the Reapers. Sovereign intends to use the Citadel to open a passage into dark space in order to allow the others to invade the galaxy. We are going to find a way to stop it.”

“How, exactly, does it intend to do this?” Valern asked skeptically.

“The Citadel is a dormant mass relay that leads to dark space. It directed me to find the Conduit in order to gain entry to the station and activate it,” Saren said.

The Councilors looked at each other and then said, “Commander Shepard, is this true?”

“I don’t have proof,” she said, “but I believe him.”

“In that case, Saren must be kept as far from both the Citadel and this Conduit as possible,” Valern said. “Your ambassador wishes for you to return here to answer for your refusal to kill Saren and your admission of him onto your team, but that does not seem to be a wise course of action at this time. Until he has proven himself loyal once more or you have found a way to prevent this alleged invasion, you must stay away.” 

“We need to go to Ilos,” she said.

“Ilos is in the Terminus Systems,” Sparatus pointed out. Shepard repeated her conversation with her admiral but, unlike the human, the Council was not convinced. “We cannot allow this, Commander. The risk of war with the Terminus is too great.”

Shepard’s eyes flashed and she said, “So, what? You want me to just sit out here in space playing jailer while Sovereign closes in on the Citadel?”

Tevos said, “We will monitor the relay, and if it comes through, we will close down the Citadel and deploy our fleet.”

“That will not be sufficient,” Saren insisted. “By the time you realize it’s there, it will be too late.”

“We cannot close off the Citadel indefinitely,” Sparatus said. “There are ships that need to dock and depart, business that needs to be conducted, and a lockdown could panic the residents. We are confident that Commander Shepard can find alternate ways to get the information she needs.”

Shepard ended the call and slammed her fist onto the console. “Damn them,” she muttered. “What hope do we have when we’re being led by fools who remain intentionally blind?” She straightened and said, “You’re going to have to share my cabin. The only room left is in the cargo hold and Wrex, Tali, and Garrus are down there along with several members of the human crew. I won’t have fighting on my ship. The elevator is too damn slow for me to get there before one of them kills you and I wouldn’t put it past Wrex to try. A seven-hundred-year-old krogan battlemaster, as it turns out, is incredibly difficult to control and his loyalty to me only goes so far after Virmire. He thinks I destroyed his people’s last chance at finding a cure for the genophage when I took out your breeding facility.”

“I wasn’t breeding the krogan,” he said. “I was cloning them. Breeding would have taken too long to bring them to full maturity. There is no point to curing the genophage when you plan to harvest their race.” His tone was bitter as he said the last part.

“That might help me out a little, but it won’t change the fact that I thought it was a breeding facility and blew it up anyway,” Shepard said.

“I’m still a bit irritated with you over that,” he informed her. “I had planned to retire on Virmire. Now, the best part of the planet is irradiated.”

“Should have thought about that before you started cloning a krogan army and indoctrinating innocent people for study. That was _sick_ , Saren. I know you weren’t in control, but it’s still sick and wrong,” she said unsympathetically. “I need to go check on my crew, write my report, and figure out our next move. Come on, I’ll show you to my cabin. I don’t spend much time in there anyway unless I’m working.”


	4. Chapter 4

He explored her cabin while she talked to her crewmembers. He was surprised at first that she would leave him unattended with her private terminals until he tried to access them out of curiosity and discovered that her encryption had improved. The comm clicked on and she said, “Get out of my computer, Saren. I have the VI set to notify me if access is attempted by anyone but me.”

Caught, he turned his attention to the rest of the room. It was almost turian in its bareness. There was nothing here to reflect the person who occupied the space. She had no pictures, no tokens, nothing personal either displayed or hidden away. The room was exactly as it seemed, or so he thought until he discovered a case under one of the floor grates. He lifted it and opened the case to find a stringed wooden instrument with a bow beside it. It looked old but well cared for and he wondered what it was and what sound it produced. The door opened behind him and he looked over at her without shame. She had to know he would look around.

“It’s a violin,” she said. “Have you ever heard one?”

“No,” he answered. “Human music is nothing but a cacophony of sound set to a barely discernible rhythm.”

She smiled slightly and said, “You just haven’t heard the right thing.” Her hands were sure but gentle as she lifted the instrument from its case and placed it beneath her chin. She drew the bow across the strings and a silken note emanated from it. He hadn’t expected to find it pleasant. Her eyes closed and she began to play a tune from memory. The tones of the violin were similar to turian secondary vocalizations and it was as if she was playing emotion rather than music. It was at times solemn and almost mournful and then lilting and soaring with wonder. By the time she finished, he’d sat down on the cot in stunned silence. She opened her eyes and raised a brow. “Well?”

“What was that?” he asked.

“The ‘Kyrie’ from _Pope Marcellus’ Mass_ ,” she answered. “It’s an ancient religious piece. I don’t do it justice. It’s supposed to be sung without accompaniment by a choral group.”

“I had not been aware that humans had an appreciation for any type of true beauty, nor that they could actually create something such as that,” he said and managed to sound disdainful even as he paid the compliment. 

“It’s a very versatile instrument,” she said and began to play something else. This was fast-paced, almost frantic, and made him uneasy though he didn’t understand the meaning of the words she more spoke than sang. It was something about an entity called the devil whom he supposed was the villain of the tale challenging a human boy to a duel, but he didn’t know what a chicken was—though he assumed it was a type of food since he’d heard that everything in the galaxy tasted like it—or what it or a dog had to do with a duel. She used her omni-tool to produce the accompanying instruments and her timing was impeccable. She moved as if her entire body was involved in the production. The music itself, however, made his plates itch. The sounds she produced for the devil-creature’s parts felt like Sovereign’s voice in his head. He was relieved when she moved on and somewhat amused when she looked him directly in the eye and said, “I done told you once, you son of a bitch, I’m the best that’s ever been.” 

When she finished with a foot stomp and a flourish, he said, “That was quite different.”

“It’s called, ‘The Devil Went Down to Georgia’ by a man named Charlie Daniels. I have to admit, I’m not extremely familiar with old Earth geography and I don’t know where Georgia is, but I think it was a state in the Americas back when they were divided. The imagery doesn’t make a lot of sense but I like the passion. I have more but I need to get back to work. Don’t touch this, please. It was passed down through my family and is the last thing I have of my father’s.”

“He’s dead?” he asked.

“Killed in the First Contact War,” she said. “My mom hates turians almost as much as you hate humans.”

“And yet you now have two on your ship,” he said.

“Our differing viewpoints have been a source of contention over the years,” she admitted. “I prefer to judge a person on character rather than something as arbitrary as species.” 

With that, she sat down at her terminal to write her report. She tuned him out so completely as she worked that he might have thought she’d forgotten he was there. Humans’ abundance of fingers did allow for a certain speed when doing tasks such as typing and he admired the way that hers flew over the haptic keys. Watching her distracted him from the growing whispers in his mind for a time, but eventually, the silence of the room allowed them to rise inside of him until he rose and began to pace. She stopped and turned to face him. “Problem?” she asked.

“Sovereign,” he said. “It’s telling me to kill you while your back is turned. Your barriers are down and you have no armor. I could put you in stasis and rip out your throat before you could react. It wants me to destroy you, take your ship, and go back to it. It’s promising to overlook my betrayal if I return and allow it to implant me as it had planned to do after I finished on Noveria.”

“Do I need to tell you that it lies?” she asked, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms nonchalantly. 

“No, Shepard,” he said disdainfully. “I’m not a fool, especially when it comes to forgiving betrayal. It would use me, but it would destroy me once I had accomplished what it needed. It is simply driving me to distraction having these damn whispers in my head. My mind was my own and now it is not. That is maddening. It is even worse knowing that I allowed it to happen. I killed Nihlus.” The admission sounded as if it was torn from him. “He was more than a student. He was a friend. He trusted me and I killed him in cold blood. I shot him in the _back_.”

“Yes, you did,” she said. “Would you do it now?”

“Of course not!” he said. 

“Would you have done it before?” she asked.

“Why would I?” he responded.

“Then it wasn’t you,” she said. “It was Sovereign through you and that may seem like splitting hairs, but it’s an important differentiation.”

“What is hair and why would one split it?” he asked.

She pointed at her head and said, “This is hair. The expression is used to denote attempting to make petty distinctions.”

“Why don’t you simply say as much?” he asked in exasperation.

“You’re on a human ship,” she said. “You’re going to have to learn our colloquialisms.”

“Speaking of which, distract me. Tell me about your discussions with your crew,” he said.

She shrugged and said, “They aren’t happy with me, but they aren’t going to leave. Kaidan threatened. He’s angry because our friend Ash died on Virmire protecting the bomb and I might have had time to get to her and save her if you hadn’t intervened. Garrus is angry because he joined me to stop you. I pointed out that if you truly are able to fight the indoctrination and help us, then we have stopped you and that there is more than one way to achieve a goal. What he meant by ‘stop’ was ‘kill’ and I would have done that had it been necessary. I don’t kill without a good reason.”

“Neither do I,” he said, “but you can always find a reason.”

“Of course you can,” she agreed. “I simply had a better one to keep you alive. Anyway, he eventually calmed down. He’s young and hotheaded, but he’s loyal almost to a fault. Short of murdering his family or slaughtering innocent people or letting the Reapers through, I think he’d likely forgive me for just about anything. Liara is worried about Benezia. It was hard on her, seeing her mother indoctrinated and fighting against her. Tali is concerned but wonders if she could get information on the geth from you to take back to the Flotilla if you really are on our side. She’s young, too, and a bit single-minded. Wrex just wants to kill you. You murdered some guys he worked with a few years ago and still owe him for a bounty. Joker thinks I’ve gone insane, but like Garrus, he’s also loyal to a fault.”

“Kaidan would be the human soldier. Wrex the krogan. Who is this Joker?” he asked.

“The pilot,” she said.

“Ah. The weakling who cannot walk,” he said. “I do not understand your reasoning with that one.”

“He has brittle bone disease,” she said. “He’s still the best damn pilot in the Alliance fleet and one of the best in the galaxy. He’s gotten us out of some difficult situations like when Therum erupted on us. I wouldn’t trust anyone else at the helm of this ship.”

“I think Joker and Vakarian are not the only ones who are loyal to a fault,” he said.

“I lost my entire squad on Akuze because I couldn’t hold them together,” she said bitterly. “That won’t happen again. My team trusts me because I’ve earned it and because they know I’d walk into hell for them and drag their asses right back out.”

“What happened on Akuze?” he asked. 

“Thresher maws,” she said. “A whole nest of them. We went to investigate one of our first-in teams on a new colony that had gone dark. When we arrived, there was no sign of the team and no evidence of what had happened. It was like they’d just gotten up in the middle of dinner and vanished, only their weapons were also missing. We searched throughout the day and when night began to fall, we made camp in a valley. No one wanted to go back and sleep in a ghost town. Shortly after the beginning of the second watch, the ground began to shake. We all got out of our tents, but we thought at first that it was an earthquake. There had been some reports of seismic activity in the area over the past few days, so we gathered in the center of the valley in case of landslides. It just made us easier to pick off. They tore through my squad. None of us had a clue what they were or how to fight them. Their acid ate right through our armor. I watched my best friend dissolve right beside me when he pushed me out of the way and took a direct hit. I watched my XO get eaten by one of the damn things while I fired rockets down its gullet. When the others realized they were fucking _eating us_ , they broke.”

“How did you survive?” he asked.

“I tried to rally them but nothing was getting through. One panicked and then another and then it swept over the group, and rather than follow me to high ground, they just ran blindly. I found a patch of rocky land and made my stand there. When I ran out of rockets and had gone through all of the ones I could get to without going too far from the rocks, I found a sniper rifle one of my guys had dropped and I started shooting the monsters. It did no good. They didn’t even seem to notice. One grabbed Jacobs and I shot him. Another spit on Morales and left him with nothing from the waist down. There was no saving him, so I shot him, too. One by one, I had to take my team down myself and the whole time I was screaming at them to get to my position and they just kept running. All I could do at that point was take the pain away when they got caught and try to wear the maws down with bug bites. By the time the Alliance arrived, they were all dead. I don’t remember getting to the LZ. The worst part is that I found another survivor recently, Corporal Toombs. He said Cerberus turned the maws loose on us as a goddamn experiment. They watched us die and did _nothing_. If I ever find their leader, I will kill him slowly and painfully.”

“The scar on your back, that’s from the acid?” he asked.

“Yeah,” she said. “One got me when I was running for the rocks. I got lucky and it didn’t eat down to my spine. Somewhere between there and the LZ, I apparently stopped by the compound because when they found me, my back was covered in baking soda in an attempt to neutralize the acid. I don’t know if it helped or not. I didn’t really care to ask at that point.”

“How many were there?” he asked.

“I don’t know. It was hard to get an accurate count in the dark with them moving around so much. I counted at least three up at one time,” she said.

“You held off a trio of thresher maws on foot with limited weaponry and no advance warning, while watching your friends die horrifically around you and suffering a maw acid burn over a large portion of your body, and yet you still believe yourself a failure,” he said. “I know experienced Spectres who could not have survived that.”

“Like I’ve told you before,” she said quietly, “survival isn’t everything.”

“Uh, Commander?” Joker said over the comm.

“I’m here, Joker. Go ahead,” she said.

“Ambassador Udina has ordered us to Arcturus Station. He, Admiral Hackett, and Captain Anderson want to meet with you,” Joker said.

“Take us there,” she said.


	5. Chapter 5

Arcturus Station was massive, and while smaller than the Citadel, based on a similar design. There were agricultural sectors and housing areas that comprised the majority, but the center of it held the base itself and was home to the Fifth Fleet, which was under Admiral Hackett’s command. She left Saren on the ship and took Kaidan and Garrus with her to meet with the group. Udina sneered at Garrus and immediately launched into her for allying with Saren rather than killing him. He threatened to have him removed from the ship and shot. Shepard told him in no uncertain terms that in order to do so, he would have to first get through herself and her crew. Udina called her a traitor and threatened to have her court-martialed. Before Hackett could say anything, Anderson punched Udina in the face. 

“Was that wise?” Hackett asked him as Udina clutched his nose and sputtered.

“Maybe not, but it was satisfying,” Anderson said. 

The rest of the meeting was less exciting, but resulted in Hackett himself ordering her to Ilos and putting the Fifth Fleet at her disposal in defense of the Citadel. He was already preparing them to mobilize. Anderson pulled her aside and asked if she’d lost her damn mind trusting Saren, but reluctantly accepted her judgment. She returned to the ship and announced, “All right, boys, let’s get ourselves to Ilos! Hackett’s orders. Coordinates are already loaded into the system.”

Kaidan said, “Am I the only one who enjoyed watching Anderson pop Udina in the face?”

Garrus grinned ferally and Shepard said, “No, Lieutenant, you were not. I think that made my year.”

When she told Saren about it, he said, “Perhaps he has gained some modicum of wisdom.” 

She gathered the crew and instructed them to prepare. Once they found what they needed on Ilos, they would return to the Citadel. Things were likely to move very quickly from that point forward. Everyone agreed with her selection of Liara for her ground team but her addition of Saren was met with resistance. Garrus said, “Are you sure that’s a good idea, Shepard? What if he’s just using you to get the information from Ilos or to get to the Conduit?”

“He could have gotten there without me,” she said. “He certainly doesn’t need me to do that. However, he may be able to help us identify whatever it is that we need to find.”

She dismissed them and went to her cabin to prepare. She reviewed the information they’d uncovered thus far in order to have it fresh in her mind and then went over her armor and weapons herself. If Benezia beat them to Ilos, they were in for a fight. There was a possibility that they would be forced to use the Conduit to return to the Citadel if she found it before they did. Whatever happened, Shepard wanted to be ready. Saren prepared alongside her. It was strange but not unpleasant to have companionship during this waiting period before what could conceivably become a high-risk mission. Just getting to Ilos was a feat in itself. 

She brought out her violin and played “Ave Maria” because it generally soothed her, but even that was not sufficient to dispel her nervous energy. Finally, Saren grasped her around the waist and said, “You seem tense, Shepard.”

“Me? No. I go to dead planets that may be covered in geth and an indoctrinated matriarch all the time,” she said. 

“I could help you with that tension,” he offered. 

Her brow furrowed as she considered his statement and then said, “Oh. You want to…huh. I’d thought that was a onetime thing.”

“It doesn’t have to be,” he said. “I respect and admire you, Shepard, even if you are human. I can admit to some small amount of…affection there as well, strange as it may seem. I enjoyed our previous experience and have wondered on occasion if it would be better were we not constrained by the need to keep from freezing to death.”

They’d shared a cabin for over a week, but hadn’t slept together. She’d set up a second cot for him along the wall in the work area and he’d spent his nights there. The events on Noveria had neither been mentioned nor repeated. She could admit, at least to herself, that she had thought about it as well. It had been surprisingly enjoyable. She’d never been with a turian before and despite their anatomical differences from humans, it had worked. She glanced over at the bed and said, “All right.”

The tone of this was different from the very beginning. On Noveria, they’d been uncertain and hesitant. She’d been half-awake when it had started and he’d been uncharacteristically gentle. This time, however, they knew that it would work between them and they had at least a basic understanding of how to please each other. He made no effort to hide his hunger as his arms came around her, but seemed startled when she brought her lips to his stiffer ones. He started to say something and she took advantage of it to very carefully maneuver between his teeth in order to stroke his tongue with hers. He became very still, but after a moment, his hands tightened on her and he began to respond in kind. No one had ever accused Saren Arterius of being stupid and he proved himself to be a quick study. It wasn’t like kissing a human but still had the desired effect, especially when she combined it with a stroke of his fringe. He responded by burying a hand in her hair and she pushed herself onto her toes to get closer to the contact. When he wrapped it around his hand and pulled slightly, she sighed and so he did it harder.

“That doesn’t hurt?” he asked.

“No,” she said. “You could eventually get to the point of pain, but the hair itself doesn’t have nerve endings. I feel it in my scalp. I _like_ having my hair pulled. You don’t have to treat me like I’m breakable.”

“You may regret that statement,” he warned but there was a heat to his voice that made the threat sound utterly appealing. “We have time. Show me what you like.”

He stripped her uniform and his armor and she taught him how to touch her. She showed him the places where a soft touch would make her sigh and a firm one would make her moan. She convinced him that he could use his talons as long as he didn’t outright bury them in her and he learned that the scrape of his teeth over her skin made her shiver and her head fall back. Meanwhile, she learned that his prosthetic arm did have bio-input and was almost as sensitive as the softer hide in his unplated areas and that her nails on his hips made him purr while scratching his waist made him groan. Neither of them attempted to take control and it was very clearly deliberate as both knew that an attempt at this point would result in a standoff that could end in violence as easily as sex. When she knelt in front of him and licked the slit in his groin plates, he said, “What are you doing, Shepard?”

She looked up at him and said, “Trust me. You’ll like it.”

His suspicion of her motives meant that she had to coax him out but she didn’t mind as it allowed her to practice her new skills on him. When he released from behind his plates with a groan, she drew her tongue along the underside of his shaft and felt his hand tighten on her hair. He was prepared to pull her away if necessary but was tentatively giving her his trust. She felt his legs tremble when she took him into her mouth and he purred low in his chest. The sound was almost a snarl and reminded her of a vid of a big Earth cat. He relaxed into her and the grip on her hair shifted so that he was holding her rather than guarding himself. Eventually, he used it to pull her to her feet. “Is there an equivalent for human females?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said. “It involves more tongue and less mouth, though.”

“Perfect,” he said and she shivered. Rather than going directly, he trailed soft nips down her body and used his hand to make her moan. When she arched into him, he looked up and said, “Patience, Shepard,” in a long-suffering tone. “Humans are always so impatient.”

He took his time about it but eventually reached her center. The first touch of his tongue made her jolt and she fisted her hands in the sheets. He gave a snort that could have been amusement or satisfaction as he explored her with his mouth and she continued to writhe. She’d never experienced anything like this and when his tongue entered her, she all but shouted his name. He chuckled and said, “I suppose this is another way in which turians are superior to humans.”

“Don’t stop!” she protested. “Compare later!”

He laughed openly at her but resumed all the same. Her hips bucked and she cried out when his teeth scraped lightly over her clit. Her hands reached down to twine into his fringe and she felt his moan inside of her. When she began to tighten around him, he withdrew and darted up to cover her. She gave an uncharacteristic yelp of surprise when he flipped her and pulled her onto her knees. He pushed into her in a quick thrust and she gasped at the suddenness of his intrusion. Then he pulsed inside of her, flaring the soft barbs that lined his cock, and she bit the side of her hand to muffle her resulting moan. He leaned forward, pushing himself deeper into her and said into her ear, “ _This_ is how turians fuck.” 

His talons scratched over her waist and dug into her hips as he held her unmoving against him and he continued to pulse. It didn’t have the friction she was used to but the sensation was entirely new and almost overwhelming in its intensity as he seemed to touch every place inside of her. His finger came down to rub against her clit and she began to move instinctively, seeking the friction to go along with his pulsating movements. When she did, he groaned loudly, “Spirits, yes.” It took a few tries, but he coordinated the pulses with thrusts into her and she lost all track of place or time. 

“Oh, god, Saren,” she moaned into her pillow. “Just like that. Please don’t stop. Oh, fuck, don’t ever stop.”

“That could make both fighting and Council meetings a bit awkward,” he pointed out but there was a note of breathlessness to his voice that told her he wasn’t unaffected. She reached back to grab his slim waist and he groaned, “Shepard!” as her fingers trailed over his suede-like hide. 

Their pace increased and soon their hands were everywhere they could reach and their ragged breathing echoed off of the bulkhead. Her pillow muffled her cries and Saren’s hand gripped her hair tightly. His rhythm of thrust, pulse, withdraw was quickly driving her insane and then she felt the tingle of biotics against her skin. She tensed but relaxed again when she realized that he was tracing some kind of biotic field on her back. It penetrated deeper than skin and when she called out his name, he chuckled and flared his barrier. She felt it inside and the tingle combined with his steady pounding thrusts pushed her over the edge. 

He didn’t stop there, though, and she felt the base of him begin to swell. Still he kept going until he was slamming into her and she was being stretched by every thrust as the swollen base pounded into and out of her. His talons raked her back and she heard his secondary vocals kick up and become erratic. She met his thrusts and used her hands on his waist and behind his spurs to drive him higher even as she soared with him again. This time, her convulsions triggered his and he spilled himself into her as his base filled her and locked him inside of her. He nipped her shoulder and rested his forehead against her spine. 

That night, he slept in her cot. He put his back to her, but when her arm went around his waist, he muttered something about stabbing her in the eye and rolled to face her. He turned her so that her back was to him and his arm came to rest heavily over her waist. He cursed and said, “Where, exactly, does one put one’s arm in a situation such as this?”

“You’ve never cuddled before, have you?” she asked. Honestly, she was only surprised that he was willing to do so now.

“I tend to leave before morning,” he said stiffly. “However, seeing as that is not an option here and your bed is larger than mine, it seemed appropriate.”

She shook her head and adjusted his other arm so that it went under her neck. She wasn’t quite lying on him but it was close. He huffed out a sigh and continued to shift, moving both of them until he was comfortable. It resulted in him half lying on her, but she could breathe and didn’t mind his weight or the roughness of his plates. He seemed to realize that they were on her bare skin at the same time she did and grumbled as he shifted the sheet so that it was between them. She hadn’t expected consideration from him and his vocal displeasure at giving it was endearing, especially when he muttered about her hair. She took pity on him and reached up to tie it in a bun. “Is everything about you flexible, human?” he asked in a put-out tone.

“Most of it, yeah,” she said.

“There is no logical reason why you are the apex of life on your planet nor why you were able to withstand us for so long during the war nor how you manage to survive all that you do,” he said. “You’re soft, pliant, bend the wrong ways, lack natural armor or weapons, and your fur doesn’t even cover all of you in order to keep you warm.”

“It isn’t fur,” she protested. 

“It evolved from fur,” he pointed out.

“Screw you, Saren,” she said.

“You did,” he said cockily. She huffed and rolled her eyes.


	6. Chapter 6

When they discovered that Benezia had, in fact, reached Ilos ahead of them, she consented to the addition of Garrus to her ground team. Contrary to his belief, it was more due to her concern that Liara would not be able to do what needed to be done when facing her mother than fear that Saren would turn on her. It was a tight fit in the Mako, but they managed even with the insane drop that Joker had to make to get them there. She did have to admit that having a fourth person in her team was helpful given that they had to fight their way through the geth Benezia had left behind in order to get into the archives in the first place. It was strange as well, though. They were all used to working in a team of three and the division of labor was off. When she could, she sent Garrus to high ground with his sniper rifle and Liara on crowd control while she and Saren provided the brute force. They noticed at the same time that the geth were targeting him specifically and she didn't need his confirmation to make the decision to utilize it. While they were focused on him, she charged. Liara kept the hoppers off of her and Garrus picked them off one by one. 

Once they'd made it into the archives, Shepard let Liara take the lead. Rather than information caches, however, it appeared that they'd stumbled upon a vault full of stasis pods. Shepard wondered how that would help them and where they might find the intel they needed. "Liara," she eventually said as they drove through another bank of pods, "the Protheans didn't bury their dead with things, did they?"

"No," Liara said. "However, I don't think these were buried. I think the pods were supposed to maintain them until the threat was over. It looks like they ran out of time, and instead of a bunker, it became their tomb."

They all shouted as the Mako hit something they couldn't see and tried to climb the invisible wall in front of them. Shepard backed up and tried again with the same result. There was some sort of barrier here. Leaving the VI to guard the Mako, they left the vehicle to investigate. Liara pointed out a door that eventually led them to an ancient VI calling itself Vigil. Saren turned away and when Shepard tried to stop him, said, "Sovereign is still in my head. Anything we learn here, it will be able to access as well. I will go watch over the Mako. From this point on, it would be wise to limit the information that you give me."

When they returned to the vehicle after speaking with Vigil, Saren asked no questions. Shepard said simply, "Benezia has found the Conduit." 

"We should hurry, then," he said. 

"Agreed."

"Wait," Liara said. "Have you ever ridden with her hurrying in a Mako? We do want to make it there alive."

"Very funny," Shepard said as she engaged the throttle. 

"I wasn't joking," Liara squeaked. 

"My driving is not that bad," Shepard said.

"Shepard," Saren said.

"It isn't!" she insisted.

"Uh huh," Garrus said doubtfully.

"Shepard," Saren said again.

"Look, if all you guys are going to do is make fun of my driving, I can pull over and leave you for the geth. I don't need four people to fight this. I really have gone up against greater odds with less help," she informed them.

"Shepard!" Saren said sharply.

"What?" Shepard shouted.

His voice was calm once more as he said casually, "Drop off."

"The Mako can take it," she said confidently.

"Okay," Saren said.

"Okay?" Garrus asked. "Okay? Not okay! Shepard, we need to have a discussion about what you term acceptable risk. Oh, spirits!"

"We're _fine_ ," she said as the mako bounced wildly and shot forward.

"Colossus on ladar," Saren informed her.

"Only one?" she asked as she ran over a geth rocket trooper. 

A few minutes later, they topped a rise. The Conduit was below and a glowing beam shot up into the sky. Between it and them were a large number of geth and easily half a dozen colossi. The Conduit was closing. They didn't have time to fight. Saren, Garrus, and Liara looked at her expectantly. She judged the distance needed to travel, the speed of the Mako assisted by the downhill slope, the number of enemies, and strength of their shields. With a nod, she said, "All right. Batten down the hatches and strap in tight. This is it."

Saren had clearly anticipated her reaction as he'd already begun to buckle into his harness. Liara tended to ride with hers on anyway. Garrus grumbled but closed the hatch for the cannon and slid down to join Liara on the bench in back. When everyone was strapped in, Shepard gunned the throttle. In her peripheral vision, she could see Liara with her hands gripping the edge of her seat hard enough to turn the knuckles almost white. Garrus muttered, "Now I know why Sovereign has such a difficult time stopping you. You're completely insane. Therefore, it can't predict what you'll do next. It's easy, though, really. Just think of the craziest, most unlikely thing that one could do and make work and that's what you're going to pick. Unless you can think of something crazier and even more unlikely."

"You love it," she said. "You wouldn't be here if you didn’t."

"I never said I wasn't a little bit crazy, too," Garrus said.

"I think we all are," Liara said in a high voice.

"Hold on tight," Shepard warned as they hurtled toward the Conduit. "Here we go!" She closed her eyes and when she opened them, they were upside down in the Presidium near the tower. Sovereign was latched onto the top of the building and fire burned everywhere, adding to the eerie orange glow of the closed ward arms. This wasn't good. Avina flickered in and out and wouldn't answer when she asked if the Council had been evacuated. 

Thus began the longest and most difficult battle of Shepard's career. Sovereign and Benezia threw everything they had at them. Saren was half-crippled by the screaming Reaper in his head but fought on anyway. She hadn't accounted for the possibility of him being disabled by Sovereign and was glad she'd decided to bring Garrus. Saren helped where he could, but Garrus was the one who took down the geth destroyer that attempted to break her spine. They made it to the Council chambers before Shepard looked over at him and saw bright blue blood trickling from his nose. The smears across his white face plates told her it had been bleeding for a while and he'd simply wiped it away and continued fighting. She pushed him down behind a rock and ordered Garrus and Liara to keep an eye out for them. 

"You don't have to do this to yourself," she told Saren. 

"It's merely a nose bleed," he tried to tell her but then gripped the sides of his head and doubled over. 

"Watch our backs and stay out of the way," she said. "That's an order." 

"Shepard," he protested as Garrus waved at her to hurry. 

"Don't argue," she said and motioned the others to move. 

Benezia dropped from a point above them when Shepard went forward to insert the disc that Vigil had provided. The matriarch threw the three of them into stasis and Shepard heard Saren's warning shout too late. She watched helplessly as he ran forward, heedless of the blood pouring from his nose, and threw Benezia back, breaking her hold on them. Liara cast a singularity and Saren warped it. The resulting biotic explosion shook Benezia's barriers enough that the matriarch retreated and sent in her commandos. Shepard shot a look at Saren and he seemed to heed her warning at first, but when she had a moment to look around, she realized he was hunting for Benezia. He knew the Council chambers better than they and was utilizing that knowledge. He found her as the last of the commandos went down. Shepard saw her soar across the room from Saren's throw. Liara caught her in the air with another singularity and shouted, "Mother!"

Benezia said, "You cannot defeat me! Saren was a fool. Sovereign has gifted me with the upgrades that were intended for him and I am more powerful than ever. Join me, Little Wing, and you will be spared!"

"Don't call me that!" Liara shouted and threw another warp to detonate the singularity. Shepard sent out a shockwave to keep her off of her feet as Garrus fired a concussive round at her to further weaken her barrier. 

"You're indoctrinated, Benezia!" Shepard shouted, ducking behind a low wall as the matriarch rose and glowed blue once more. 

Shepard, Liara, and Saren did their best to talk Benezia into lucidity. It had been relatively simple with Saren. She understood him on a very basic level and knew the buttons to push. Liara’s mother was a mystery to her. Saren was having enough trouble fighting Sovereign’s influence while physically in his presence and Liara’s pleas fell on deaf ears. Try as she might, Benezia had an argument for everything Shepard said. Saren finally said, “It learned, Shepard. Your arguments won’t work. I wasn’t enhanced the way she is and Sovereign has been working on her to resist you.”

Shepard looked to Liara who said, “That _thing_ is not my mother.”

“All right,” Shepard conceded. “Take her down.”

The fight was brutal but Liara held up admirably. Shepard was proud of her. However, once Benezia was down, Sovereign turned its full attention onto Saren. While Garrus was checking Benezia to ensure she was truly dead, Saren fell to his knees, clutching his head and rocking himself back and forth. Shepard uploaded the disc and then ran to him and held his face between her hands. “Look at me,” she ordered. When he didn’t comply, she moved his head so that she could see his eyes. “Look at me,” she said again. “Stay with me, Saren. You can fight it. You’ve been fighting it. Look at me.” She placed her forehead against his and heard Garrus gasp behind her. She ignored him as Saren’s hands locked around her wrists.

“Don’t let go,” he said.

“I’m not going anywhere,” she assured him. 

“The wires,” he said brokenly, “the ports. Rip them out.”

“What will that do to you?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t care. Rip them out,” he said again, his voice growing increasingly desperate. 

“Don’t you dare die on me,” she whispered and reached behind his head. She gripped the thick cables on the back of his neck and pulled as hard as she could. They tore free with a horrific ripping sound and she threw them aside as Garrus came up behind him and slathered medigel on the wounds. Saren released his hold on her and gripped his prosthetic arm. With a vicious curse, he tore it from his body as she pulled out the cable on his leg. 

“Commander!” Joker shouted over the comm. 

The _Destiny Ascension_ was in trouble. She had to decide between saving the Council or sending the full force of the Alliance fleet against Sovereign. If she saved the Council, human soldiers would die. If she sent them up against Sovereign, they might die anyway. If she let the Council die, humanity could handpick a new one. However, this Council had seen firsthand the effects of the Reapers. Others might not take the threat as seriously. Gearing up for an intergalactic war was not the time to unsettle the galaxy with new leadership. She instructed Joker to save the _Destiny Ascension_. Saren stared at her and Garrus said, “You know you just sentenced a lot of humans to death.”

“I know,” she said.

“Why?” Saren asked.

Her reply was cut short by something that caused the platform to rock and they went tumbling down into the garden below. Shepard called out to her crew and then looked up to see something that might once have been Benezia. Shepard attempted to charge it but succeeded only in slamming herself into a wall. She shook her head and looked around for the creature. Saren glowed blue and shouted, “Now, Shepard!” She charged again as Saren held the thing that had been Benezia in stasis. He released her as Shepard crashed into her and Shepard immediately shot her with her shotgun. 

It felt like they fought for hours before the creature finally fell. There was no doubt this time as the Benezia creature exploded into ash. Shepard heard Hackett shout something about Sovereign’s shields going down and looked up to see Joker pull a looping dive with the _Normandy_ that she wouldn’t have thought possible. A moment later, Sovereign broke apart and began to fall. Shepard shouted a warning to her team, but before she could move, she was thrown to the ground as a piece of the Reaper hit her. She tried to roll away, but her arm was pinned. She heard someone shouting her name and then a weight pressed down onto her and she felt the tingle of biotics. Turning her head, she saw Saren beside her with a biotic bubble around them. He rolled her into the piece of the Reaper and she bit back a shout of pain as the bones in her arm shifted. It struck her as ironic that he was using the Reaper itself to shield them from the debris thundering down around them. 

She didn’t know how much time had passed before things settled and Saren dropped the barrier. “Thanks,” she said tightly. 

“Don’t thank me yet,” he said. “Spirits only know how much that damn thing weighs.”

“A lot,” she informed him helpfully. “How’s your head?”

“I feel like I’ve been danced on by a herd of rampaging elcor but the voices are gone,” he said. “My mind is my own.”

“Good,” she said and began using her nails to dig at the dirt beneath her arm. She couldn’t lift the piece of what she thought was a leg up off of her but it had landed in a section of the garden rather than on one of the marble slabs. The ground had compacted from the impact but it still moved. Saren huffed and used his teeth to remove his glove. He unsheathed his talons and began to claw at the ground himself. His method was much more effective and she was soon able to slide her arm out of the tunnel he’d made. He helped her to her feet and they made their way out of the debris field to find the others. It had been long enough for help to arrive and she found Garrus and Liara standing beside Anderson. Clutching her injured arm to her side, she smiled at their astonished expressions.

Two soldiers immediately approached and attempted to apprehend Saren. Shepard put herself between them and said, “He needs medical attention before anything else is done.”

“Shepard,” Anderson said, “he’s a criminal, a damn terrorist!”

“No!” she shouted, turning to face her mentor. “He was indoctrinated. He can’t be held responsible for that! Since breaking Sovereign’s hold, he has done _nothing_ but help us. He tore his own arm off to keep Sovereign from taking over again! He’s a damn hero and you will _not_ deny him medical care because you don’t like him! What he did to your friend was wrong, but so were you on Camala. Get over it, sir! Your friend is alive and without the information Saren obtained on that mission, we’d be completely unaware of the Reapers and likely well on our way to dead by now. Our focus needs to be on ensuring that the sacrifices made today were not in vain and that we are ready when they come again and not on petty grudges!” She activated her comm and said, “Joker, get Dr. Chakwas down here.”

The soldiers made another attempt to get through to Saren and she fixed them with a glare and allowed her biotics to flare. “I just took down that thing,” she said, gesturing over her shoulder to the Reaper. “You really think you can take me? Stand down. Spectre authority.”

Anderson’s eyes widened at this reminder that she, in some ways, technically outranked him but he called off his dogs. “I hope you know what you’re doing, Shepard.”

“That was probably wise,” Garrus said to her as Anderson turned away. “I don’t know about humans, but only a fool tries to cross a turian protecting his or her mate.”

“Her what?” Shepard asked. 

Garrus grinned and looked at Saren. Ignoring her question, he said, “I knew it. You didn’t tell her what it meant.”

“What are you talking about?” Shepard demanded.

“That thing you did with your forehead earlier,” he said.

“What about it?” she asked. “Touching foreheads is an affectionate thing.”

“That may be all it is in humans,” Garrus said, “but it’s a bit more than that with us and doing it publicly with someone non-related is a very clear declaration. By doing it, you told any turian watching that he’s your mate. And now you’re protecting him like a mother volcari.”

“I think you’re reading too much into it,” Shepard said, missing the way that Saren’s eyes shuttered behind her. She started to say that they were together, but the honest truth was that she didn’t know what they were. They’d never discussed it. For all she knew, he never wanted to see her again. So she said nothing and simply watched as Dr. Chakwas walked up and scanned him. 

The doctor said, “I need to remove the fluid built up in your brain. You were on the verge of a hemorrhage. You’re lucky not to be dead, Agent Arterius. You also need surgery to remove the rest of the ports and graft a new arm. David, I’m taking him to Huerta. Any decisions about him can wait.”

Shepard wanted to go with them, but had to trust the doctor because the Council had arrived and there were decisions to be made. She chose Anderson for the Council when given the option. It might end up screwing Saren in the long run, but humanity didn’t need to be represented by Udina. Anderson would at least consider new evidence and admit when he’d been wrong. Udina sputtered and shot her a baleful glare, but the decision was made. When she was released, she went to the hospital.


	7. Chapter 7

Saren was arrested upon his release. Over the two weeks that followed, she saw him only when he was brought in for questioning or when she and her crew testified on his behalf before the Council. They ordered her out to the Terminus Systems to seek out geth resistance. The day she left, she demanded a private meeting with Saren. She was allowed an hour in one of the interrogation rooms in C-Sec. After disabling the cameras inside the room, she turned to him. 

He pounced before she could speak and pinned her arms above her head with his new prosthetic. His grip wasn’t as strong as before, but his real hand was sure as it stripped her of her armor. His mouth crashed down onto hers. She gasped as he sheathed his talons and plunged his finger into her. She rocked against his hand, helpless to do more than move with him as he worked her. When she was gasping his name, he hooked her legs around his waist and thrust sharply into her. The wall was cold against her back in stark contrast to the heat radiating off of him. His movements were deep, quick, and almost desperate. She was caught up in it and in him. She gripped him tightly with her legs and bowed into him, meeting his rough thrusts. He snarled and nipped her shoulder. She moaned and he sank his teeth into her flesh. She tightened around him as her release hit her and she shouted his name. He followed a moment later and released her arms so that she could wrap them around his neck. He brought his forehead to rest against hers.

“We need to talk,” she said quietly.

“Yes, we do,” he agreed. 

“The _Normandy_ is shipping out in a few hours. We’re headed to the Terminus to wipe out the last of the geth,” she told him.

“Fools,” he sneered. “The geth aren’t the real problem.”

“You have to convince them of that,” she said. “Anderson told me that Tevos and Sparatus are pushing to have you not only released but reinstated. He and Valern are the holdouts. He still doesn’t entirely believe you aren’t working for the Reapers and Valern wants to cover the whole thing up. Even Sparatus is trying to say that the geth were the real issue and Sovereign was one of their creations. You have to make them believe us. They won’t listen to me.”

“I know what I need to do,” he said. “What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to go fight the geth. Garrus is staying here. He wants to go through Spectre training and needs to be evaluated. Sparatus has agreed to assign him to me if he passes. Liara, Tali, and Wrex are staying with me,” she said.

“That isn’t what I meant,” he said.

“You mean…us?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said. He withdrew from her and waited while she straightened her clothing and replaced her armor. “Look, Shepard, I know I am not…I cannot give you what I don’t have in me.”

“If you want to end this, whatever it is, just say so,” she said, trying to ignore the way her heart clenched at the thought. 

“No!” he said. “You deserve someone who doesn’t hate your people, someone who can tell you he cares about you without feeling weak for doing so, someone whose life doesn’t rest on the whim of a fickle Council, someone attractive like Vakarian. I know you deserve better and I’m selfish enough to tell you not to go find it because I want you.” He stepped forward and took her into his arms. “Just think of what we could be, Shepard, of what we could do. Together, we could be unstoppable.”

She stood on tiptoe and he leaned down so that she could press her lips against his mandible. “I don’t want Vakarian,” she said. “I don’t want someone else. I want you. I don’t know that I would call it love or anything yet but I do want you.”

“I don’t know that I am capable of love, Shepard,” he said seriously. “However, I…don’t think I could find a good enough reason in this galaxy to kill you.”

And if that wasn’t a declaration of love from him, she didn’t know what was. She said, “I’m yours. You’re mine. Let’s just leave it at that for now, hmm?”

“Thank the spirits,” he sighed. “I was afraid that you would desire romance. Women seem to expect that sort of thing.”

“You want to be romantic?” she asked. “Clean my armor for me or bring me shotgun mods. I’ll be as happy as a clam.”

“Human idioms,” he huffed. 

She kissed him again and said, “Our time’s up. I’ll try to get in to see you again when we come back if you aren’t already released by then.”

She didn’t come back. Saren found out about the attack two weeks later when Garrus Vakarian stumbled up to his cell, looking shell-shocked. “Shepard’s dead,” he said as if he didn’t quite believe it himself.

“What?” Saren asked dumbly. “How?”

“The Alliance intercepted a distress signal from the _Normandy_ six hours ago. It was attacked by an unknown enemy. The official word is that it was the geth, but Joker is reporting that it wasn’t. He didn’t know what it was. Shepard went to get him into the escape pod and got spaced when the ship came around for another attack. Liara said he’s distraught and has broken all of the bones in his hands.”

“I don’t give a shit about your pilot,” Saren snarled. “Shepard’s suit should have protected her even in space for long enough to be rescued. Where is she?”

Garrus raked his hands along his fringe and said, “The crew reports seeing air venting from her suit and Shepard struggling. She went still before being dragged into the atmosphere of the planet they’d just vented the heat sinks in. They haven’t found her body yet.”

“Then she isn’t dead,” Saren said. “Until there’s a body, she is not dead.”

“Arterius,” Vakarian said.

“No,” he snapped. “Come back when they find her.” 

He didn’t come back, either. Eventually, the Council released and reinstated him. Anderson said he’d agreed only for Shepard. Saren did his best to convince them of the Reaper threat, but the human he disdained was the only one who didn’t show himself to be a fool. Even Sparatus looked at him with growing irritation when he attempted to warn them. They sent him out on increasingly lengthy and difficult missions and so it was months after Shepard had been reportedly spotted on Omega before he heard the rumors. He discounted them because they claimed that she was working with Cerberus and Shepard loathed Cerberus. 

When he walked into the Council chambers to find her standing on the balcony beside Anderson with Vakarian and a human woman Saren had never seen before, he stopped in shock. Her armor was new and she looked slightly different. Her face was covered with scars and her hair was a different length. The woman sneering at him wore a Cerberus logo on her skintight uniform. However, Vakarian was with her. He would know if it wasn’t really Shepard, wouldn’t he? No, Saren decided. That wasn’t enough for him to take as proof. _He_ would know. Vakarian cleared his throat and Shepard turned. Her lips drew up into a smile, but he was struck by the red glow behind her eyes and shining through the scars on her face. 

“Who the hell are you?” he demanded.

She blinked and said, “Commander Shepard. Forgotten me already, Saren?”

“You are not Shepard,” he said. She might be a clone, or more likely, a high-tech VI or even AI that thought it was Shepard, but the woman he’d known would never work for Cerberus after learning that they’d caused the attack on Akuze. 

The other human said, “I assure you, she is. I put her back together myself.”

Saren looked at her dismissively and said, “She had two bite marks on her body. Where were they?”

The woman said, “Considering that her skin was almost entirely burned when we recovered her body, I’m afraid I can’t answer that.”

The thing that looked like Shepard said, “Forearm and shoulder.”

“Vakarian could have answered that,” he said, remembering that the other turian had seen the marks. 

“Walk with me,” she said.

“I need to report to the Council,” he said. “I have better things to do with my time than chase an impostor.”

He couldn’t say whether her flinch was caused by real pain or guilt. He turned his back on her, dismissing her, and she left. Vakarian stopped and said, “If you don’t want her anymore, be turian enough to say so. If you truly don’t believe it’s her, give her a chance. It is Shepard. I would stake my life on it. Hell, I already have.”

The conviction in the other turian’s voice gave him pause. He said stiffly, “I will consider it.”

“We leave the Citadel at 0600,” Vakarian said. “The new _Normandy_ is located in the public docks. Bay G17.”


	8. Chapter 8

Saren made his report to the Council and then stopped by his apartment to unpack his gear. When he found himself hesitating to do so, he forced himself to take an honest look at what he was doing. If it really was her, then he fully intended to join her again if she allowed it. Whatever mission she was on must be absolutely critical if she was working with Cerberus. Gratitude for bringing her back wouldn’t be enough to convince her to abandon her convictions. It had to have something to do with the Reapers. He cursed and went in search of the ship. 

He found the _Normandy_ where Vakarian had told him it would be. He hesitated before entering the airlock but continued on anyway. It probably wasn’t her, he told himself. People couldn’t be brought back from the dead and he had, over time, come to accept that she was, in fact, dead whether her body was found or not. His Shepard hadn’t had glowing eyes. This creature was more cybernetic than human. It had more cybernetics than he did and that was saying something. He would not be swayed by a replica that looked like her. 

However, if it _was_ her by some miracle of science and technology, he couldn’t pass up the chance to find her again. He had never needed or wanted anyone to be a part of his life since Desolas had died. Nihlus had been the closest thing he’d had to a friend and even that was a relationship marked by distance and continual disagreement. Shepard, though, had printed herself indelibly on, if not his heart, then himself. The galaxy had felt empty without her. 

A regulated female voice requested his identification and purpose. He announced himself and the airlock doors slid open to reveal the bridge. To his left was the cockpit where the pilot she’d had previously sat eyeing him suspiciously. “She’s coming down,” the pilot said and turned away from him. Saren huffed at the human’s insolence and strode across the bridge to the CIC. The ship was larger than the previous _Normandy_ and brighter as well, though the layout looked similar. It was clearly based on its predecessor and he wondered how Cerberus had managed to get the plans. They likely had moles in the Alliance. 

He expected her to come through one of the doors on either side of the bulkhead in back but, instead, a set of elevator doors slid open in the center. He realized the human script above the doors identified a lab and an armory. Given that most of the time the ship did not dock on planets where missions were run, he thought the placement of the armory foolish. The team would have to come up in the elevator to retrieve their gear and then back down to the shuttle bay before they could leave for a mission. He gazed suspiciously at the lab. Cerberus was not known for their humane experiments. That she would allow such on her ship made it even less likely that this was truly Shepard. She waved him into the elevator and he stood stiffly beside her as she hit the control for the deck above. 

He used the time in a confined space with her to subtly inhale her scent. It smelled somewhat like Shepard. There was an undertone that was slightly artificial and it didn’t help his suspicion. She didn’t speak. When the doors opened, she led him into an opulent cabin. He stopped and took in the sight of the built-in aquarium, the display cases with the model ships she’d begun collecting, the medals along the wall, and the furry critter in a glass cage on a shelf. Shepard had never been one to collect clutter like this and she hadn’t cared about commendations. Her cabin on the first _Normandy_ had been what humans termed Spartan. The desk had been the only spot that had acquired clutter and yet here it was almost fastidiously neat. 

Further into the room was a large, plush bed and a set of luxurious couches with a low table. He noted the pair of wine glasses and wondered who she’d been entertaining. The table along the bulkhead held a battered helmet. He went to it and held it up to his face. Here was Shepard’s true scent, but it was mixed in with the smells of burned flesh and death. He put it down quickly and cursed. She had truly died, then. He turned to face her doppelganger and said, “You should hope that you are able to convince me, human, for if you cannot, I will kill you for having the audacity to foist this…deception onto the galaxy. You are not Shepard.”

“I guess you did manage to find a good enough reason,” she said.

“For what?” he asked.

“To kill me,” she said. 

“Disabled or not, there were cameras in that room,” he said. “You will have to do better than that.”

“The honest truth is that I haven’t even managed to convince me, yet,” she said with surprising uncertainty. “Would you know? If I’m not me, I mean? Do I smell the same? I know I don’t look the same. It’s subtle, aside from the scars, but there are differences. They didn’t get it exactly right. My memories are there and they’re right as far as I can tell. I think I’m me but, hell, Saren. How would I know? People don’t come back from dead and even I can smell death in that helmet.”

“Tell me about Noveria,” he said. 

“You separated me from the team and we fought until the power went down. It was freezing. You suggested a truce. I called you a coward. We ended up with you naked and me in my underwear wrapped in our emergency blankets. We had sex.”

“When?” he asked.

“When we woke up,” she said. “I was still half asleep and didn’t believe it was you at first. Then, the night before Ilos, you came to me. Our last time was in the interrogation room on the Citadel before we shipped out for the Terminus Systems. You took me against the wall and bit my shoulder. You said that you couldn’t think of a good enough reason in the galaxy to kill me.”

"What was the instrument that you played?" he asked.

"The violin," she answered instantly. "In fact, I still have it. Liara got it off the ship and Hackett returned it to me. This is what I was doing when you showed up." She went to the locker on the other side of the room and retrieved a case. She withdrew the instrument from it and placed it under her chin. He leaned back against the bulkhead and watched critically as she drew the bow across the strings. The song she began sounded mournful, especially when she began to sing. "I pirouette in the dark. I see the stars through me." Her face was sad and exhaustion flowed from her. "Tired mechanical heart beats till the song disappears." The music turned and became more forceful. "Somebody shine a light. I'm frozen by the fear in me. Somebody make me feel alive and shatter me..." Her voice was almost ragged as her fears and insecurities tore from her in an admission he doubted she would make to anyone else. The bow in her hand flew as her fingers moved across the strings and her body moved with the music in the way he remembered. It was like she was pouring everything into the instrument and allowing it to express the emotions she couldn't bring herself to voice on her own. Desperate, angry, afraid, lost, alone, it all rang out in the cool air of the cabin. "If I break the glass then I'll have to fly. There's no one to catch me if I take a dive. I'm scared of changing, the days stay the same. The world is spinning but only in rain." A clone couldn't express this in the way she did and even an AI wouldn't experience it. This wasn't simply music. This was an exorcism. 

When the song ended, she replaced the instrument with careful hands. Hesitantly, she walked toward him and bared her throat. “Either kiss me or kill me, Saren. If I’m not who I think I am, then I have no business leading this mission and I don't want to be here.”

He placed his teeth on her throat and she shuddered and brought her hands up to rest on his collar. Her pheromones flooded his nostrils and she pulled him closer. He didn’t know if the idea of death turned her on or if it was his proximity. When his arms came around her, he saw a drop of moisture slide down her jaw. She relaxed into him but didn’t move her throat from his grip. His tongue dragged across her neck. He applied more pressure, pricking the skin with his teeth, and licked up the droplets that bloomed on the surface. She tasted like Shepard. With a groan, he ripped the front of her shirt open and palmed her breasts. He’d never learned to like the appendages aesthetically, but he had come to enjoy her reactions to them. She whimpered and pressed into his hand. 

Without releasing her, he backed her up to the bed and laid her down. She went willingly and lifted her hips for him to remove her black slacks as she toed off her shoes. She moaned when his fingers found her hot center and her hips bucked when he slid them into her. “Saren,” she whispered. She sounded like Shepard. Whether it was truly her or not, she was close enough for now. The years had been so long and he’d been so lost without her. One more time, he told himself. One more time, and if it wasn’t her, he’d kill her. But first, he would let himself believe. He would claim her again.

Her hands found the sensitive spot beneath his fringe and pressed in just the right way. He groaned and shifted his teeth to her shoulder. He wouldn’t bite down, not until he was certain. If she wasn’t his Shepard, she wouldn’t wear her mark. He wouldn’t give his Shepard’s mark to an impostor. He would, however, take from her body. He was rough as he buried himself inside of her and she gasped but her legs wrapped around his waist and her fingers slipped between the spines of his fringe. She called his name again and he withdrew to thrust himself into her wet heat once more. Her nails raked down the back of his neck, avoiding the scars there, and followed the path they’d taken before. He realized that she hadn’t habituated to the ports being gone and the scars healed. That was a memory that only Shepard would have. His obsession with Sovereign had made it so that sexual release interested him even less than it had before. She was the only person he’d been with since losing his arm and allowing Sovereign and the geth to graft the new one and install their cybernetic ports. “Shepard?” he asked.

“Saren,” she whispered in response. “Oh, gods, I’ve missed you.”

The admission undid him and he placed his forehead against hers. “Shepard, I…am going to get you a shotgun mod.” She laughed wetly and cupped his face in her hands. Her thumbs stroked his mandibles and he said, “Your eyes are different.”

“Do you know what happens to eyeballs when you lose pressurization in your suit?” she asked. “It isn’t pretty. ‘Meat and tubes’ is what Jacob called me.”

He didn’t want to think about that, so he silenced her by covering her mouth with his. Her tongue slipped between his teeth and she sighed. He picked up his pace again and drove into her, desperate now to reconnect. He hadn’t just lost a friend or a lover when he’d lost her. He’d lost his mate. He still didn’t know if he was capable of love, but he was capable of bonding and he’d bonded with her. She was his partner, his equal, the person he respected more than anyone. She was his human counterpart and the only person who’d ever truly seen him to his core. He was a loner. He didn’t know how to need someone the way he needed her. 

Fortunately, she seemed to need him just as much. She’d never been one for the gentle lovemaking that he'd heard some females of her species preferred. Her teeth and nails were as forceful as any turian female and she met his thrusts with a ferocity that would rival one of his own kind. His hand around her throat drew a moan and she pushed up into it as she raked the underside of his fringe hard enough to border on pain. When he snarled and sunk his teeth into her shoulder, she bucked hard against him and convulsed tightly as she came. He poured himself into her and felt himself swell and lock into place. Only then did she gentle as he brushed her hair back from her face. She buried her nose in his throat beneath his jaw and he felt a surge of protectiveness toward her. Yes, she was definitely his mate. 

“I love you, Saren,” she whispered. 

Love. Did he love her? He would die to protect her. He would kill anyone who threatened her. He would follow her into hell, and from what little she and Vakarian had said about their mission, he thought he likely was about to agree to do so. He’d been empty when she’d died. She had saved him from Sovereign and given him his mind back. He could never repay her for that. No one could take her place. If that wasn’t love, or close enough to it, he didn’t know what was. So he said quietly, “I…love you, too, Shepard.”

“Don’t let go,” she said when he began to move.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he assured her. Charging krogan couldn’t tear him away from her now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song used here is "Shatter Me" by Lindsey Sterling and Lzzy Hale of Halestorm. I own none of it. If you haven't heard the song, you should listen to it. It's amazing.  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wsysh9VWEv0


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This got stuck in my head and wouldn't leave.

Saren was concerned about Shepard. She had been driven during their first mission but not like this. She ate little and slept less. She flew them from one mission to the next without so much as a brief shore leave. Where she'd used the Citadel as a home base before, she now avoided it unless they were already in the area or had no other choice but to go there. Instead, if she needed to stock up, she did so on Omega or Ilium. He understood drive. He understood a desire to complete the mission. However, he also understood that there was only so far that one could push before breaking. She had embraced the Terminus Systems with an almost gleeful fervor and, while he appreciated her newfound ruthlessness and supported it fully, he also knew that it was not like her and that she was losing a part of what made her Shepard. Her violin sat forlornly in the corner of her cabin, forgotten in the mad pace that she set. 

She took the time to interact with and get to know the new members of the crew. Saren found that he largely preferred them to the old one. Grunt embraced violence and battle. Jack, while human, was a destructive, amoral little bitch. Mordin didn't waste time with sentiment. Even Vakarian had finally grown up and lost his idealistic edge. He wanted to kill Zaeed once he'd learned that the bounty hunter was the one who'd taken out the _Verrikan_ but Shepard ordered him to stay his hand. Kasumi was...irritating with her romanticism and her tendency to attempt to sneak around the ship and discover things to which she should not have been privy but she was loyal to Shepard. 

The problem was, as always, Cerberus. He had joined Shepard's cause because it was _Shepard_ but his plates itched every time he was reminded that he now served aboard not just a human vessel, but a _Cerberus_ one. It was bad enough that they were a human terrorist organization but he had almost left when he'd realized who led it. Jack Harper. He would never forget _that_ human's face. The so-called Illusive Man--and was that not an appropriate moniker if there ever was one--was the same man who had been responsible for the death of his brother, Desolas. Sovereign had often labeled him a traitor for defecting to Shepard's side but, in his rational moments, he'd known it was untrue. He could no longer claim that certainty. He worked with Shepard, but Shepard worked with his worst enemy. It was almost enough for him to hate her. He'd stormed about the ship, terrifying the crew, for days before Shepard had made a stop on Omega and had taken him alone to procure supplies.

_Shepard closed the kiosk after her latest purchase of supplies for weapons upgrades and turned away. Rather than returning to the main thoroughfare, however, she took him by the elbow and directed him into one of the dark, dingy alleyways that lined the fetid station. A vorcha hissed at her but she ignored it. Saren stepped distastefully around a pile of refuse that he was almost certain contained a human child. He'd spent time on Omega and was no stranger to filth but he liked this place no better than most of the crew. It was the putrid pit of the galaxy, decaying even as it pulsed with the desperate dregs of organic life. He did not shy away from places like these as they were generally the ones where his services were needed most but they were an offense to his fastidious nature._

_"What are you doing, Shepard?" he finally hissed as she ducked into an even danker alley._

_"Making sure we aren't overheard," she answered, stopping beside an effluvious, oily mass of something he could not--and did not wish to--identify. She put a hand on her hip and said, "Look, I know how you feel about Cerberus."_

_"You cannot possibly know how I feel about Cerberus," he sneered._

_"They killed my people!" she shouted and then looked around to make sure that she hadn't drawn attention. She lowered her voice and said, "They killed my squad, Saren. They unleashed those goddamn monsters on us as an experiment and then watched as we were slaughtered. Fifty men,_ my _men, died on that colony because of them. I see their faces when I close my eyes. I loathe the Illusive Man as much as you do. Have no doubt about that."_

_"Then why do you remain with them?" he demanded. "Why ingratiate yourself with him? Why have you not done as Jack suggested and taken the ship?"_

_"How far do you think we'd get, Saren?" she asked. "The Council isn't paying us. The Alliance damn sure isn't paying me. Who is going to fund this mission? Cerberus may be stingy with the credits but they have not skimped on the resources. I can't get that anywhere else. The_ Normandy _doesn't fly on space dust and the dreams of her crew."_

_"What are you suggesting, then?" he asked._

_She gave him a conniving grin and said, "We complete this mission. We learn whatever we can about Cerberus and the Illusive Man while we're doing it. And_ if _we survive the relay and_ if _we are able to come back,_ then _we steal the ship and, if we can, use it to hunt these bastards down and take them out."_

_He stared at her for a moment and then said, "Spirits, I knew there was a reason I love you. You are devious, woman."_

_"I know," she said. "So, can you tolerate working among them for a few months and treat this as an undercover recon mission or do I still need to drop you on Ilium?"_

_"I will help you, Shepard," he said. "I look forward to sinking my talons in that bastard's throat. I have been trying to find him for decades."_

But accepting the prudence of working with Cerberus and actually doing so were two completely separate things. He could tolerate the pilot, Joker, though he still wanted to tear his head from his shoulders for allowing Shepard to get spaced in the first place. He even held a certain fondness for Dr. Chakwas. The engineers below irritated him but amused Shepard so he tolerated them. The other humans, though, Jacob Taylor and Miranda Lawson, and Kelly Chambers, were almost enough to drive him to madness. Taylor's haughtily disdainful glare was infuriating. Lawson's cold dismissal was almost as bad. Chambers, at least, had the sense to stay away from him most of the time but if he never heard her chirp, "New messages for you, Commander" or wax romantic about the other members of the crew or poetic about the way his eyes sent chills down her spine, it would be too soon. 

Shepard was not in her cabin when he went looking for her. Likewise, she was not on the bridge nor was she in the mess hall or the med bay or down in engineering or the cargo holds or shuttle bay. He was about to presume that she had gone into one of the crew's quarters when he heard noise coming from the lounge. The cacophony of sound told him it was that drivel that humans called music. It had a slightly better rhythm to it than most and that made him think it might be Shepard's even though she generally had better taste than this. Of course, if he were fair, she said that turian music made her teeth ache. If he'd heard that from any other human, he'd have cited a lack of aesthetic appreciation but that was not the case with Shepard so perhaps it was simply a physiological difference in the way that they experienced it.

Curiosity drew him toward the door. Shepard liked music, but she didn't generally like it so _loud_. The volume level almost rivaled Afterlife. He could feel the reverberations in his feet through the deck. The door opened with a swish he couldn't hear over the music and he stopped in his tracks. Shepard was, indeed, in the room. She had her back to the door and her ponytail swung as she sung into the mouth of the bottle of whiskey in her hand as if it was a microphone. He had seen Shepard dance once and had not been impressed. Death and her subsequent resurrection had not improved her ability or lack thereof. However, she was certainly...earnest. 

"Hope is our four-letter word. Make that money, watch it burn. Old, but I'm not that old. Young, but I'm not that bold. And I don't think the world is sold on just doing what we're told. I feel something so wrong doing the right thing. I could lie, could lie, could lie. Everything that drowns me makes me wanna fly." The hand holding the bottle came up, sloshing golden liquid over the rim, as she mimed a spaceship soaring through the galaxy of stars that were her backdrop. He wasn't certain whether to be horrified or amused. He couldn't catch most of the words as she was turned away from him and his translator struggled with some of the phrasing. However, he finally understood what was going on with her when he heard, "Everything that kills me makes me feel alive."

He had wondered when she was going to acknowledge her death and what form that acknowledgement would take. She had been running from it. Something had happened to make her face it. He thought it very well could have been the culmination of Benezia's daughter and Urdnot Wrex' refusals to join her and the reception she'd received on Horizon from now-Commander Alenko. It hadn't seemed to affect her much at the time but he knew how emotionally attached she was to her crew and, thus far, only he and Vakarian had elected to rejoin her. Everyone else had moved on. He thought it was a testament to turian loyalty and, therefore, superiority until he remembered the pilot and the doctor. He discarded them just as quickly. They weren't combatants. It was different with them. 

There was a ripple in the air as a cloaked Kasumi Goto slipped from the room. "Look after her, will you?" she whispered as she passed.

The song ended and Shepard turned with a flourish. Her eyes widened when she saw him standing there but, rather than appear ashamed, she simply grinned at him as yet another song queued up. "Get out your guns, battle's begun. Are you a saint or a sinner? If love's a fight, then I shall die with my heart on a trigger. They say before you start a war, you better know what you're fighting for. Well, baby, you are all that I adore. If love is what you need, a soldier I will be," she belted out. Her voice was not unpleasant but the somewhat glazed look in her eyes told him that she likely would not remember much of this in the morning. He decided that he should be able to remind her. She ignored the glow of his omni-tool as he recorded the show. 

"I'm an angel with a shotgun, fighting 'til the war's won. I don't care if heaven won't take me back. I'll throw away my faith, babe, just to keep you safe. Don't you know you're everything I have? And I wanna live, not just survive, tonight." He had to review what he knew of human mythology to understand the meaning of the first lines. Angels had been compared to turian spirits, though he thought the comparison entirely inaccurate. Spirits were not true entities like angels purportedly were. However, the description was apt. The afterlife was a common theme between turians and humans, though he didn't know if they were the same. Why wouldn't it take her? Why would she have to throw her faith away to protect him? "Sometimes to win, you've got to sin. Don't mean I'm not a believer." Ah. Human afterlife was dependent on things such as morality and abstract ideas such as sin. Clearly, she believed herself a sinner. He wondered if she realized what she was revealing about herself. And did she truly believe that he was everything she had?

She turned her back on him and resumed her dancing, effectively dismissing him from her...what? Exorcism? Grieving? Celebration? He didn't know if even she was certain what she was doing. Perhaps she was simply having fun and he was reading far too much into it. Perhaps she was simply expressing her joy at being alive. An angel with a shotgun. An angel of death, maybe, he thought. Ignoring her dismissal, he moved further into the room and took a seat on the couch. Of one thing he was certain, she was not entirely herself tonight and Kasumi had been correct to ask him to watch over her. He might enjoy making her squirm with the vid the following day but he would not allow her to do anything to truly embarrass herself or affect her crew. 

His movement caught her eye again and she winked at him over her shoulder. That was a particularly strange human gesture. She turned and bent to put the bottle on the deck before straightening. Her hands went to her shirt as the tone of the music changed. His brow ridges rose as she began to unbutton the garment. When he was certain of her purpose, he ordered the ship's AI to lock the door. Before he could begin a mental rant against having an AI on board the ship, her shirt dropped to the floor and she began to unbutton her slacks. He forgot the AI and allowed his gaze to rove over her as more flesh was exposed. He was beginning to truly appreciate her alien form and was still amazed that she was drawn to _him_ but he'd stopped questioning it. Now, he was simply possessively satisfied that he was the one who got to see her like this and determined that no one else would. She was _his_. 

Her pants dropped, leaving her only in her undergarments--her feet had already been bare--and she sidled toward him. She may have been a terrible dancer by any species' standards but there was no denying that the woman could move when she wanted to. Her hips swayed as she strolled and when she bent at the waist and drew a slim finger down his keel, he purred with appreciation at the way the position emphasized her collarbone and the angles of her body. She moved to straddle him and pushed his hands away when he attempted to place them on her. She nipped under his throat, recognizing him as the more dominant partner even when she took control. He nuzzled her hair with his mandibles, acknowledging her, and she began to lick and nip her way down the side of his neck as her hips swayed, rubbing her against him and making his plates shift. 

"Saren Arterius, getting a lap dance from a human and liking it," she said with a laugh. "Who would have ever guessed?" 

"No one and rightfully so," he answered. 

"Oh? So you don't like it?" she asked archly. "I can stop..." He grasped her wrist as she began to pull away and she smiled mischievously at him. "That's what I thought."

"Do you not think that our cabin would be a more appropriate place for this?" he asked.

"My cabin doesn't have cameras," she said. 

"Precisely," he said.

She began undoing the seals on his armor as she murmured in his ear, "The Illusive Man set a trap for us that sent us into the ship that killed me with no warning. Fuck. Him. Let him see his tool get fucked by his rival on his ship. He isn't stupid enough to think that I would still be loyal after that." With that, she waved her omni-tool and reactivated the cameras. He was honestly surprised that Kasumi had left them in place. She shared his distaste for being recorded.

Oh, this was a game he could easily play into. It might not be the wisest but she was right, they would be getting no further information from Harper. She did, however, have Miranda now though the one she called the Illusive Man didn't know that. "You want me to fuck you, human?" he asked. "Are human men so inferior that you must come to me like a whore in order to have your needs met?"

"No human could do the things you do for me, Saren," she answered with a malicious gleam in her eye that excited him even further. 

"Of course they couldn't," he said. He stopped her from removing his tunic and sliced through her undergarments with a talon. "I am going to _ruin_ you, Shepard."

"You already have," she gasped. He felt a tremor run through her as he lifted her off of his lap. She knelt obediently in front of him as he opened his pants for her. There was honest appreciation in her eyes as she leaned forward and ran her tongue along him. The angle of her head ensured that his cock was easily visible to the cameras scattered around the room. She moaned and slipped her hand between her legs. She'd never done that when they had been together and he could only presume it was part of the show. She was demonstrating her eagerness. He allowed his head to rest against the back of the couch but kept his eyes on her as she took him into her mouth. He was determined not to allow his body to visibly react to her. She could feel the rumble of his subvocals but externally, he was the very picture of mild indifference. 

The truth was that he loved her mouth. The things that she could do with it were unlike anything he had experienced. Turians were not capable of doing what she did now. He'd had no idea that pleasures like the ones she freely gave to him existed. He ran his talons through her hair and used his grip on it to move her as he wished. He enjoyed what she did on her own but he relished the idea of Harper seeing him dominate her. Her breathing grew heavier and he could feel the sounds she made. The rumble in his chest rose until he knew it would be almost audible even to her. If they were alone, he would tell her how much he enjoyed it but he wouldn't break from his role here. 

When her face was flushed and her muscles were beginning to tremble with her need for release, he tugged her to her feet. She went willingly as he led her to the window and pushed her face and chest against it. She cried out as his finger dipped into her wet heat. He was always stunned by how _warm_ she was there. Turians ran hotter than humans, so she generally felt cool against him. This one place, though, was always warm even to him. He drew his finger out and spread her fluids around to ease his passage. He knew that humans still viewed anal penetration as somewhat dirty and taboo even though they participated in it regularly. It wasn't something he'd done with her before but what better way to demonstrate his total and complete ownership over her body? She gasped and cried out in surprise as he pressed his finger into her tight hole. She was even hotter here and her muscles gripped him even more securely. 

"Are you afraid, Shepard?" he taunted.

"No," she said. "But you are far too big."

"I think you can handle it," he said, dismissing her concern. She was tight but she could take him if she relaxed. 

"Yes, sir," she said demurely and his mandibles flared in delight. She was playing along. He might be the more dominant partner by virtue of his greater well of experience and superior physical strength but that by no means made her weak nor did it mean that she would follow him without question or at all should she choose not to. His duty was to protect, not to rule, her. This was different. This was submission and a submissive Shepard was infinitely alluring. He nipped her shoulder hard in reward and she didn't protest. She was sturdier since she'd been rebuilt. She was more difficult to injure and healed faster. The skin weaves she'd gotten had only enhanced that. He no longer had to be cautious with his teeth and talons. If he cut her, the wound closed within minutes. She enjoyed it as well, which was certainly a bonus. 

The alcohol had all but burned through her by now but it was enough to aid in her relaxation and he was soon moving easily within her while she pushed back into his hand. When she gasped, "Saren, please!" he removed his finger and lined himself up with her. Her fingers clenched against the glass as he pushed slowly into her ass. The mewling cries that came helplessly from her were more musical than whatever drivel had begun to play from the speakers. He tightened his hold on her hair as his other hand slipped around so that he could circle the bundle of nerves that never failed to draw a reaction from her. He was rewarded with the sound of his name ripping from her mouth as she began to writhe, caught between his solid frame and the window. "Fuck yes," she groaned as he hilted inside of her.

"Is this what you want, Shepard?" he asked her, pulling hard on her hair. "To be used and degraded by the turian who was your enemy?"

"Yes, sir," she moaned. 

"Human women are such whores," he said disdainfully. "But you are _my_ whore, are you not, Commander Shepard?"

"Yes, sir," she moaned again as she pushed back into him. He obliged her by thrusting sharply into her, stretching her almost to the point of pain before doing it again. She let out a strangled cry and he felt her center grow even wetter. He pounded into her without mercy and the sounds she made as her fist banged against the glass were downright carnal. She cursed not only in her own language but in his as well and he felt her foot stomp as words blended together into unintelligible moans. 

"Beg," he ordered tersely. "Beg me for it, Shepard."

"Oh, gods, Saren," she cried out. "Please. Fuck, please. Fuck my ass, Saren. Fuck my ass and make me come, please!" 

She sounded absolutely desperate. He grinned wickedly and leaned his head down to purr into her ear, "No."

"No?" she demanded. "The hell do you mean, no? I'm dying here!"

He pulled sharply on her hair and tweaked her nipple hard, making her cry out. "You asked. I said no. Perhaps you can change my mind before I finish using you."

"Saren, please!" she moaned long and loud. "I'm so close. I need...I need...fuck. Please, please, please. Oh, gods, Saren. I can't. Please, sir, please let me come."

"I'm not stopping you," he pointed out as he slipped a finger into her. "Come for me, Shepard. Show me how much you like it when a turian fucks you in the ass like a harlot."

"Oh, fuck!" she shouted and he felt her convulse around both his finger and his cock. "Oh, gods. Saren!" Her head fell back, baring her throat to him and he locked his teeth over it as he snarled low enough that only she could hear. Her orgasm was harder and more intense than any she'd had with him previously and he was unprepared for the way it wrung itself through her. The sight of her coming apart so completely in his arms was one of the more beautiful things he'd seen and he slammed himself into her tight ass and spilled himself into her body. 

Her knees gave out and he caught her with an arm around her waist. She was breathing heavily and leaning fully against him. "Hell, Saren," she said breathily. "That was the best I've ever had."

"Of course it was," he said as if there was no question that he should be able to pleasure her better than someone actually designed to fit with her. He disengaged himself from her and forced a sneer that once would have come naturally at the sight of her on her knees with her hair disheveled and his fluids dripping out of her. Now, however, he thought she looked wild and free and beautiful. "Clean yourself, human. You are filthy."

Later, in their cabin, she wrapped her arms around his neck. "That really was fantastic," she said with a sigh. "What do you think the Illusive Man's reaction will be?"

"He will rage," he said surely. He nuzzled her neck and said, "It wasn't too rough?"

"It was perfect," she answered. "You're perfect."

"I wasn't finished," he told her and carried her to the bed. She wrapped her legs around him and gasped as he slid into her. "Activate your biotics," he ordered.

She began to glow with a soft blue corona. His own sharper one appeared and clashed against hers before melding together to surround them both in a halo of dark energy. It flickered over their skin and through the nodules spread through their musculature. He had never joined his biotic field with another, had never trusted another enough to allow them in, to literally bring someone else inside of his barriers. That she was human no longer mattered. All that mattered to him that she was Shepard and she was his. He owned her just as surely as she owned him and he would not let her go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Counting Stars" by OneRepublic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hT_nvWreIhg  
> "Angel With a Shotgun" by The Cab https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_oBcdMkvOnQ (With a super awesome fan video for FemShep)


End file.
